The Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, China's top legislature, approved extending a pilot corruption supervision program nationwide as part of the vow to "put the supervisory power in the cage of institutions". It means that by early 2018, supervisory commissions will be set up by the people's congress at provincial, city and county levels across the country to ensure that all public servants exercising public power are subject to supervision. Such a program has already been piloted in Shanxi and Zhejiang provinces, as well as Beijing, since early this year. According to the program, the relevant functions of administrative supervisory organs and anti-graft agencies will be integrated into the supervisory commissions, which, being directly responsible to same-level people's congresses, are endowed with supervision, investigation and other powers. Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China in 2012, the country's top disciplinary watchdog has launched an unprecedented anti-corruption campaign nationwide. However, how rigorous and effective supervision can be exercised over the anti-graft personnel themselves had also become a conspicuous issue. Currently, supervision over discipline officials is mainly from within the discipline inspection system itself, while supervision from other parts of society remains inefficient, lags behind or is even absent. This has resulted in the scenario that "even the sharpest sword cannot cut its own handle", as experts have cautioned. As General Secretary of CPC Central Committee Xi Jinping pointed out, no one is privileged to have power beyond the law. This explains the authorities' efforts to extend the corruption supervision pilot program as a step to impose institutional restraints over those with anti-corruption power. The establishment of supervisory commissions nationwide, which will help resolve the long-thorny problem of "who supervises the supervisor", marks China's first and also necessary step toward bringing its power onto a track of institutionalized use and putting it in a cage. -Southern Metropolis Daily November 8, 2017 Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirims family is among the rich and powerful named in the latest dump of confidential documents, according to Cumhuriyet, the only Turkish news outlet that collaborated in the international investigation. Yildirims family, including his two sons, were found to have investments in Malta enabling them to avoid paying taxes in Turkey, the newspaper said this week. They join a list of sundry figures like Queen Elizabeth, U2 front man Bono and US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson as well as corporate giants, who have used offshore companies to hide their wealth, according to data taken from the Bermuda-based law firm Appleby Group. More than 13 million documents were leaked in the latest trove, dubbed the Paradise Papers. Such tax avoidance is technically legal, experts said, but the news raises questions about the ethics of elected officials or celebrities seeking tax havens not widely available to the general public and comes at a time when many are deeply frustrated that the super-wealthy do not pay their fair share. The popular Yildirim, who served as transportation minister before taking over a top government post last year, said the report was an attempt to create a perception around him, though he did not deny the existence of the investments. These are companies whose activities are open and clear, Yildirim said at a news conference on Tuesday before traveling to the United States for an official visit. When I entered politics, I left my business to my children. They do their job and I do mine. I recommended that my children never work with the state nor borrow money from state banks. Maritime is an international business, and they work everywhere around the world. There is nothing secret or hidden, Yildirim said. Maltas corporate tax rate for foreign companies is 5%, compared with a 20% or higher rate for business profits in Turkey. Yildirims sons Erkam and Bulent have registered companies in Malta, and Erkam is the director and main shareholder. At least one of the companies is involved in the buying and selling of ships, yachts and other marine vessels, as well as their financing. One firm is linked to an Istanbul-based entity whose shareholders have won state contracts from the Transportation Ministry, Cumhuriyet said. Other Yildirim relatives are involved in three more companies registered in Malta, and still other relatives and friends with companies based in Turkey have links to firms in Malta, the paper said. It also said separate documents showed Erkam Yildirim won a $7 million government tender this year, despite the prime ministers recommendation that his children avoid doing business with the Turkish state. Yildirim told reporters he was willing to be subjected to all financial and legal investigations in the matter. Parliaments third-biggest party, the Peoples Democratic Party (HDP), has submitted a motion for an investigation, and the main opposition Republican Peoples Party (CHP) has said it too will submit a proposal to look into the offshore wealth of elected officials and their relatives. As the government seeks to stop the Turkish economys downward trend, it has raised taxes on citizens, turning it into a tax hell. Tax increases have reached 40%, unsettling the public, while the names of those close to the president, prime minister and other high-level politicians appear in the documents of a tax paradise, wounding the publics conscience, wrote HDP group deputy chairwoman Filiz Kerestecioglu in the motion, according to an emailed copy obtained by Al-Monitor. Aykut Erdogdu, the CHPs deputy chairman, said Yildirims call for an investigation was a direct challenge to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who dismissed Yildirims predecessor after he spoke out against corruption. Cumhuriyet found the names of Turkish Energy Minister Berat Albayrak, who is Erdogans son-in-law, and his brother Serhat Albayrak in the Paradise Papers. Dozens of offshore companies were allegedly set up with links to Calik Holding, a Turkish energy-to-textiles conglomerate, when Berat and Serhat were running the Istanbul-based company, it said. Serhat is listed as the director of one Malta-based firm that is no longer active and whose activities were never included in Caliks financial reports, it reported. In total, 93 Turkish people and companies appear in the Paradise Papers, according to Cumhuriyet. On Wednesday, Cumhuriyet reported that hotel developer Fettah Tamince, known for declaring his love for Erdogan, has offshore companies in Malta and the Virgin Islands that he allegedly used to avoid paying taxes on his hotel investments. Coverage of the Paradise Papers has been scant in the Turkish press, but social media lit up with the revelations. Twitter users pointed out that of the four accounts Yildirims official account follows, one of them belongs to Malta President Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca. Yildirims office issued a statement saying he only followed her after she followed him. Cumhuriyet, one of Turkeys oldest dailies, is at the center of a criminal trial in which 17 of its staff members are accused of aiding terrorism in connection with the papers critical coverage of the government. The Istanbul-based paper joined hundreds of colleagues from 96 media organizations around the world to examine the Paradise Papers as part of an investigation by the Washington-based International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. The latest release followed last years Panama Papers, when nearly 12 million documents were leaked to reveal legal information about more than 200,000 offshore businesses. One Direction's Louis Tomlinson is back with his sophomore solo album, Faith in the Future . Tomlinson's pop songwriting skills work well with the throwback early 2000s style emo and pop-punk tracks here; these just may be some of the most infectious, addictive, guitar-driven tracks out there. It's a good mix for these uplifting, growth-focused tracks--the album is called Faith in the Future , after all, and that seems to be both the personal impetus behind many of the lyrics as well as a mantra for challenging times. Fans will certainly dig this goodhearted, enjoyable album. If youre itching for new music from the digital realms of Aphex Twin or Squarepusher, look no further than Lynyn. Lexicon is Chicago-based artist Conor Mackeys debut electronic album under the moniker, although the multi-talented musician has also served as guitarist/composer in jazz fusion quintet Monobody and as a composer for both the Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra and Brain.fm. With Lynyn, Mackey fuses elements of footwork, hip-hop, dub, break beats, IDM, and drum & bass to create an intense yet pleasurable listening experience that ranges from the blissful to the unnerving. This is the kind of smart, engaging electronic release fans have been longing for and with Lexicon , Lynyn is speaking their language. An acoustic album with vocals by bassist Ken Casey, This Machine Still Kills Fascists was written to unused Woodie Guthrie lyrics provided by his daughter. Ten Times More is a satisfying stompfest, Talking Jukebox is dark & swinging and Two 6s Upside Down is pure outlaw country. These two legends of soulful American music combined forces to record this live date back in 2011 (just a year before Helm passed away) and it is truly sublime. Her voice takes the lead throughout most of these 12 tracks, with Helms earthy harmonies backing her beautifully. The rootsy band numbers over a dozen musicians, including Levon Helm playing his perfectly simple style of groove on drums. The music isnt flashy but its always solid, and the tune selection is excellent as well. Standout cuts include This Is My Country by Curtis Mayfield, and a powerful a capella version of gospel classic Farther Along by W.B. Stevens. A rousing rendition of The Bands own masterpiece The Weight caps things off with a bang as Helm takes his only turn on lead vocals. A life affirming document from two monumental artists. Only The Strong Survive (CD) Bruce Springsteen Bruce Springsteen's second covers album, Only the Strong Survive , finds the working class hero putting his own distinctive spin on soul classics of the '60s, the '70s, and (for a brief jaunt) the '80s. It's a combo that might sound surprising, but Springsteen's gritty, heart-on-his-sleeve voice and musical exuberance lend themselves well to these familiar tracks. His selections run the gamut from under-appreciated gems like Frank Wilson's "Do I Love You (Indeed I Do)" (1965) to canon tracks like Diana Ross & The Supreme's "What Becomes of the Brokenhearted." Sam Moore of Sam & Dave makes an appearance on "Soul Days" and "I Forgot to Be Your Lover." A spirited celebration of some of America's finest artists, performed by a living legend. CD $16.98 LP $36.98 LP $39.98 IMPERA (CD) Ghost Ghost delivers another solid scorcher of an album in the form of IMPERA . This time the bands turning their considerable/formidable talents toward an 80s-influenced metal style, with fierce riffs and anthemic melodies. Few bands could go this hard, bringing such menace and majesty to both ballads and bangers alikebut Ghost, of course, pulls it off with aplomb. If youve ever dreamt of an arena rock album about the collapse of empires fronted by a menacing pope figure, this ones for you. CD $16.98 LP $29.98 LP $29.98 This Is A Photograph (CD) Kevin Morby Kevin Morbys This Is a Photograph straddles the line between vintage back-country sound, modern emotional exploration, and timeless songwriting. The album takes its title from a photograph Morby found of his father as a young man, just mere hours after his father was rushed to the hospital after collapsing at a family dinner. Its also the name of the albums opening track and its the perfect synopsis of this excellent albumstarting off meditative and searching, the track, like this collection of songs, moves into defiance, resilience, a celebration of life in all its beauty and pain. This Is a Photograph is a powerful, affirming album thats rich in lovefor both Morbys family and his listeners. CD $16.98 Motorola US today released two new adverts which look to ask the viewer whether their phones can do what Motorola phones can. While the adverts are designed to highlight the benefits on offer with current Moto-branded phones (compared to non-Moto phones), both of the adverts do specifically show the iPhone 8 Plus as the poster phone for all others. The two ads are not actually designed to just highlight the Moto Z2 Force, but equally to highlight the benefits available to Moto Z2 Force owners due to the Moto lines compatibility with Moto Mods. To further accentuate this point the first ad draws on the newly available Moto Mod smart speaker which also comes with Amazon Alexa integration. Asking the viewer whether their phone can sound off as loud as the Moto Z2 Force can when this Mod is attached. Likewise, the second ad highlights the Moto Mod insta-share projector which basically turns the phone into a projector allowing for video content to be displayed up to 70-inches on a flat surface. The second video additionally highlights the Moto 360 camera, which allows the Moto Z2 Force to adopt the role of a 360-degree image capturing device. Both of the ads can be seen in full below. In spite of the Moto Z2 Forces wider ability to be customized through the use of Moto Mods, a report emerged today based on figures from BayStreet Research suggesting that sales of the Moto Z2 Force, across the four major carriers in the US, may have only totaled 145,000 to date. A figure which if correct is unlikely to be viewed as that impressive for what is essentially the companys flagship smartphone for 2017 and especially when compared to the sales figures touted by a number of the companys competitors. Although on a positive note for Motorola, in a separate report which also came through today (based on data from Strategy Analytics), Motorola is expected to have increased its market share in the US to 5.2-percent during the third quarter of 2017. A percentage which if correct will mean the company has almost doubled its market share in the US compared to the same quarter in 2016. Advertisement https://youtu.be/puNeDtyAqUY https://youtu.be/FQB_0JrwxXw The Google Pixel 2 / 2 XL owners who have acquired one of the two devices during the pre-order period are now beginning to receive the discount code for the Google Home Mini smart speaker in their email inboxes. For readers who may be unaware, Google previously ran a limited-time promotion allowing those who pre-order the new smartphone(s) to acquire a Google Home Mini speaker for free. The speaker wasnt shipped with the smartphones and instead, Google is now sending discount codes in the form of Store links to eligible customers via email. Customers can access these links to visit the Google Store and acquire the Home Mini speaker free of charge. The Google Home Mini was officially introduced alongside the new Pixel 2 smartphone series. It was described by the company as a donut-shaped smart speaker able to do what Google Home does but in a smaller package. On its own the Google Home Mini carries a price tag of $49, however, the company has been offering this new product for free on a couple of occasions, including the Pixel 2 pre-order promotion at hand, as well as in its recently-opened Donut Shops located in the United States and Canada. Google is now sending the respective Home Mini promotional links via email, and eligible Pixel 2 owners can access the link or the Store using the same email address in order to place an order for a Google Home Mini at the discounted price of zero dollars. Its important to note that these promotional discount links seem to be sent out to customers in phases, i.e. not every eligible Pixel 2 / 2 XL owner will get the chance to acquire the free Home Mini at the same time. Instead, Google seems to prioritize the list of customers depending on the shipment date of their original Pixel 2 purchase, meaning that those who have acquired the smartphone earlier should also receive the link in their email inboxes ahead of others. Googles minimalist smart speaker is available in three color options namely Chalk, Charcoal, and Coral. As mentioned previously, the device offers the same functionality as the full-sized Google Home smart speaker, including the voice-controlled Google Assistant. However the package is smaller and while the speaker is fairly loud, it cant really match the same level of quality offered by the Google Homes driver. But for what its worth, the Home Mini is the most affordable way to bring the companys AI-powered assistant into the home. The October security patch for the Samsung Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8 Plus is currently rolling out in South Korea, Samsungs homeland. This South Korean tech giant is currently working on an Android 8.0 Oreo update for the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8 Plus, which could be the reason behind the delay of the October security patch for the companys flagship handsets. In any case, this update is currently rolling out to the phone on three major South Korean carriers, SK Telecom, Korea Telecom (KT) and LG Uplus. South Korea is first in line, but the update is expected to reach other regions in the near future, in case you were wondering. Now, interestingly enough, the delayed rollout of this security update will not put November security update behind schedule. According to a recent report, the November security update is also ready to go, and it includes a fix for the WPA2 Wi-Fi vulnerability known as KRACK. The November security update is also expected to arrive in the coming days, so some users will essentially get both October and November security update in a span of only a couple of days. Now, as far as the October security update is concerned, this is just a small update that patches up some security loopholes, it does not come with any new features, and were still looking at Android 7.0 Nougat here, though Samsungs UI is applied on top of it, of course. The Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8 Plus are getting the update as we speak, but the October security update will surely land on more Galaxy-branded phones really soon, and the same can be said for the November security update as well. The Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8 Plus were introduced earlier this year, and have been available for purchase for quite some time now. These two handsets are made out of metal and glass, and are amongst the best-looking phones out there at the moment, as Samsung decided to switch things up when it comes to the design. Android 8.0 Oreo is on the way on both the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8 Plus, and even though Samsung did not say when exactly can we expect the update to arrive, it has been in beta testing for a while now, so its coming soon. Google has announced new results from its street-level air quality mapping project in San Fransisco, Los Angeles, and Californias Central Valley region. For those who may not recall, the project utilizes air quality sensors mounted strapped to the companys Google Street View fleet and has been measuring air quality since back in 2014. Because weather patterns, driver habits, and other factors can have profound impacts on air quality on a block-by-block and hour-by-hour basis, Google has been mapping pollution in order to create a better data set. Those vehicles collected data over the course of 4,000 hours and 100,000 miles for the most recent results. The hope is that those can, in turn, be used by city managers and others to create practical, comprehensive real-world solutions. Although the new information is certainly useful, Google also says that the data collected so far is just the beginning. As to the most recent findings of Googles air quality research, it should come as no surprise that high-density areas and industrial zones of cities are the most negatively affected. The maps show that pollution is mostly created along heavily-used city streets and highways, but that wind and weather patterns seem to move the pollutants around. San Franciscos Bay Area is particularly densely populated so, by comparison to Los Angeles, the city appears to have a higher rate of pollution spread out over larger areas. By contrast, the Central Valley shows pollution levels are tied to those same factors but the area also has lower levels of traffic and the worst air quality zones seem linked to roadways. With that said, the company also points to agriculturally derived pollutants and an apparent tendency for air quality overall to be affected by the geography of the area. Namely, the polluted air becomes trapped between the air currents brought in off of the ocean and the Sierra Nevada range so that even in the valley, pollution levels are above health recommendations. It should be said that Googles work is not directly a solution to the problems the company is hoping to address through its efforts. However, the search giant hopes that its methods and new findings will influence the leaders of some of the more than 195 nations set to attend the upcoming COP23 UN Climate Climate Change conference. Google believes that studies such as its street-level pollution mapping are imperative and will provide the basis for those leaders to undertake further studies and to find technology-driven answers to the problems associated with maintaining and improving air quality. According to a new report by BayStreet Research, Motorola has managed to shift just over 145,000 Moto Z2 Force units through carriers. Lenovo has been on a mission to increase Motorolas sales numbers ever since it acquired the company, with the Moto Z line playing an important role in this. Disappointingly for the Chinese company, though, it appears Motorolas latest flagship is lagging in terms of sales, with the total number of sales through all four major carriers in the US standing at just 145,000 units. The Moto Z2 Force launched in August of this year and was allegedly backed by a $200 million marketing campaign, which included a number of offers through each carrier. Over at Sprint each pre-order included a free Insta-Share Projector Moto Mod, while those at AT&T had the chance to get their hands on this offer for a period after pre-orders ended. These offers complemented the BOGO offer that came with T-Mobile pre-order. Nonetheless, despite this huge marketing budget, it appears the device has failed to impress customers. Of the total 145,00o units, 100,000 were sold through Verizon, largely due to Motorolas history with the carrier and the Droid smartphone line. But over at the remaining three carriers, the device seems to have been received with much less fanfare. At T-Mobile, the Moto Z2 Force has found a home with 20,000 customers, while 15,000 Sprint customers got their hands on a unit. At AT&T, though, the number was even lower, with just 10,000 units being sold between the devices launch back in August and the end of October. Motorolas flagship sales are likely lagging behind the companys initial sales goals, but considering the Moto Z2 Force is the first flagship to be made available at all four major carriers, it sets the bar for any future flagship launches that may come from the Lenovo-owned smartphone brand. Despite lackluster flagship sales, though, the companys lower-end devices look to be impressing customers, with the Moto E4 selling well so far among pre-paid customers. This device complements the Moto G5 and G5S lines, as well as the recently launched Moto X4 which, along with the Android One edition of the handset, is sure to impress a number of customers, not to mention fill in one of the remaining gaps in the smartphone market that Motorola still has. Samsung has kicked off a series of tests for 5G wireless networks in collaboration with the United States military in an effort to advance the development of high-bandwidth connectivity for warfighters. The trials are making use of Samsungs pre-commercial 28GHz mm wave system, with the 4G tests leveraging the LTE small cell technology and being conducted at 3.5 GHz, recent reports indicate. In addition, the 5G wireless network does not depend on satellites to transmit bandwidth, but instead uses small antennas to distribute connections to far-flung locations. That makes it possible for the network to work with a high data speed even in areas where GPS (Global Positioning System) is limited. According to Terry Halvorsen, former chief information officer (CIO) of the United States Defense Department and now CIO of Samsung Electronics IT & Mobile Communications B2B unit, the 5G network could cost less since it uses commercial technology and that it has an additional layer of protection because of the higher level of encryption that comes with the large bandwidth, adding that this results in high speed and low latency. In theory, a 5G network is capable of transmitting one gigabyte per second, though in practice the case could be slightly different due to several factors such as interference and latency, among others. Nonetheless, the technology presents a huge leap from the existing 350 megabytes per second of speed for most mobile devices today. Line-of-sight connectivity, however, does have its share of problems such as terrestrial barriers, but Halvorsen said Samsung could make use of unmanned aerial systems where antennas can be attached to so that the networks scope can be extended, especially when combat forces need to connect from remote areas with varying altitudes. Last September, the South Korean tech giant also kicked off its lab and field tests for 5G wireless network with the use of Samsungs 28GHz system and devices across various locations in the U.S. in partnership with Charter Communications. The developmental trials involving the fifth generation of mobile networks are part of Samsungs broader effort to beef up its position in the U.S. wireless market as the company seeks to grow its business over the long term. Samsung Electronics on Wednesday announced the Burgundy Red variant of the Galaxy S8, introducing yet another iteration of its popular Android flagship. The smartphone has officially been debuted in the companys home country of South Korea and theres currently no information on whether it will eventually become available in more markets, with its pricing being understood to be identical to that of the other versions which sell for approximately $900 in South Korea, though theyre also receiving regular discounts by now, almost seven months after being released. The Burgundy Red edition of the phone is explicitly being associated with fall, as evidenced by Samsungs short promo that can be seen below and features an abundance of autumn themes. Like its name suggests, the handset features a dark red finish intended to be reminiscent of the famous Burgundy wine. Only the smaller Galaxy S8 appears to be receiving the Burgundy Red treatment in South Korea, with the larger Galaxy S8 Plus even starring in the same commercial, albeit featuring the previously launched Orchid Gray color. The new variant of the Android-powered flagship should be available for purchase in South Korea later this month and is becoming available almost simultaneously with the release of the iPhone X in the Far Eastern country, with Samsung presumably seeking to refresh its currently most popular handset lineup in order to do a better job of competing with its largest rival. Apart from introducing a new color of the Galaxy S8, the largest phone maker in the world also expanded its stateside Galaxy Note 8 series earlier today, having announced that the Deepsea Blue edition of its latest phablet is set to go on sale in the United States next week. The two predecessors of the Galaxy S8 lineup were being refreshed for the majority of 2016, albeit largely due to the Galaxy Note 7 debacle which left Samsung without a new flagship to compete with over the last holiday season, making the companys decision to release yet another edition of the Galaxy S8 surprise some industry watchers. Still, being one of the most profitable consumer electronics companies on the planet, Samsungs latest move was likely based on robust sales data that the tech giant analyzed and concluded theres demand for a new version of its 2017 flagship, at least in South Korea. Advertisement https://youtu.be/WufJVKouKVk Samsung Pay reached 2.5 million users in India, one million more than it had in mid-September, a company official said on Wednesday. The South Korean tech giant concluded the summer with a 47 percent market share in India, positioning itself to become an even more dominant force in the mobile payments segment in the South Asian country. Samsungs service is presently available on 26 devices in India, up from ten when it officially debuted in the country in early 2017. Its currently supported by ten banks and seven more local card issuers, with the company repeatedly signaling its preparing a more aggressive expansion going forward. Out of 20 nations in which the mobile payments platform is available, India is its third largest market by the number of users, being behind second-placed Russia and South Korea in first. India is believed to have the potential to become the phone makers largest Samsung Pay market, with its residents embracing contactless payments more quickly than consumers in most other countries, partially due to a 2016 demonetization of some popular banknotes that led to a nationwide shortage of cash. This state of affairs opened many new business opportunities in India, prompting Samsung to ramp up its efforts to launch a mobile payments solution in the country. Apart from flagship devices like the Galaxy S8, Galaxy S8 Plus, and the Galaxy Note 8, Samsung Pay is also available on some of the firms mid-range offerings like the Galaxy J7 Pro and Galaxy J7 Max, with some insiders previously suggesting that entry-level Android devices are also set to become part of the growing ecosystem in the near future. Samsung is also said to be experimenting with bringing the service to third-party devices but no concrete details on the matter have yet been shared by the Seoul-based original equipment manufacturer. While the companys Android payments platform is attracting new users at a rapid pace in India, its local smartphone sales are experiencing a more modest growth thats been getting outpaced by Xiaomi for several consecutive quarters, with Samsung now being in danger of losing its title of the largest phone vendor in the country over the final quarter of the year. The Samsung Odyssey headset is now on sale in the wake of the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update released last month, which introduced Microsofts new Mixed Reality platform and the hardware to go along with it. Samsungs Odyssey was one of the AR helmets confirmed by Microsoft in mid-October, and after a short pre-order period, the product is now launching according to the official schedule for the price of $499. Prospective buyers can also acquire the headset with Samsung Financing for $83.33 a month, however, the product is available only in a limited number of regions excluding Europe, but including the United States. Samsungs Windows-based Mixed Reality solution is the most expensive and arguably best-equipped offering designed for Microsofts new platform, with other similar devices manufactured by Acer and Lenovo already launching for $399, and Dell as well as HP offering their Mixed Reality helmets for $449. The Samsung Odyssey is equipped with dual 3.5-inch AMOLED displays bearing a resolution of 1440 x 1600 each and providing a field of view of 110 degrees through a single Fresnel lens. They also offer built-in AKG-branded headphones and are paired with a couple of 6 DOF controllers while offering built-in support for Xbox One controllers. The headset also takes advantage of a 6-axis accelerometer and gyro, a 3-axis compass, a proximity and IPD sensor, and inside-out tracking. The device weighs 4.89lbs (2.2Kg) and should provide a comfortable experience thanks to its strap mechanism which seems to place most of the weight on the users forehead rather than resting it on the nasal bridge. Other details include a couple of microphones with support for Microsofts AI-powered assistant Cortana, as well as an HDMI and USB 3.0 connector. Its important to note that Samsungs solution is not a standalone VR headset but rather one built specifically for Microsofts Windows Mixed Reality platform. As such, users are expected to hook up the Odyssey helmet to a Windows PC equipped with a dual-core Intel Core i5 (7th generation) processor and Intel HD Graphics 620 or better hardware for the base experience, or can take advantage of the headsets full capabilities on a computer running the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, as long as it features at least a quad-core Intel Core i5 (6th generation) or AMD FX-4350 processor and an NVidia GTX 1050/AMD RX 460 or a more powerful graphics card. A U.S. federal judge has officially opposed a ruling from a Canadian Supreme Court that would have seen a website and associated pages owned by Datalink de-indexed. De-indexing, for those who may not know, would have seen those web pages removed from Googles search engine effectively making it impossible for them to be found by prospective customers. Datalink has been accused of selling products that violated the intellectual property of a Canadian company called Equustek, which is what led to the ruling from the Canadian court in question. The U.S. rejection of that ruling, meanwhile, stems out of a response from Google, though the company itself was never a defendant in the original case. For its part, Google made efforts to halt the enforceability of the ruling within the U.S. on the basis that it violates the First Amendment, in particular with regards to free speech. The judge overseeing the case, Edward Davila, went further to say that opposing the Canadian ruling would be in the service of public interest since that ruling would have forced intermediaries to remove links to third-party material. That, in and of itself, Davila commented, would be a threat to free speech on the internet. However, the judge ultimately dismissed Googles reasoning. Instead, the court pointed to Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act as a being reason enough to dismiss the Canadian ruling as it pertains to Googles operation within the U.S. The company responsible for filing the initial claims in Canada, Equustek, did not make an appearance during the proceedings leading up to the U.S. courts decision. Interestingly, this is the same Section of the Act that Google attempted to invoke in a Colombian case earlier this year, although Google was forced to take down the pages involved in that particular case primarily because it was hosted on Blogger. The article in question is intended to prevent platforms that exist on the Internet from being held liable for what users of said platforms say or post on the platform. More directly, in this case, the court found that Google is not responsible for the content of the websites that appear in its search results since the information and products in question are not being promoted by the search giant. After hearing more than two hours of arguments today (Wednesday) from two sets of lawyers for plaintiffs, as well as a response to the plaintiffs motion by the Massachusetts Attorney Generals Office, Judge John Agostini of Berkshire County Superior Court in Pittsfield reserved judgment on whether to grant requests for a temporary restraining order or preliminary injunction that would pause the Berkshire Museums controversial plans to sell works from its collection. As told to me this afternoon by art-law attorney Nicholas ODonnell, who is representing three of the plaintiffs, the judge expressed considerable doubt as to whether the complainants had legal standing that would qualify them to seek intervention from the court. Enter the Massachusetts Attorney Generals Office, which late today filed an emergency motion asking the Berkshire Superior Court to allow it to become a plaintiff if those already suing to halt auctions fail to meet the standard for standing, as reported tonight by Larry Parnass of the Berkshire Eagle. As it happened, my Sothebys catalogue that includes some of the Berkshire Museums consignments arrived in todays mail. The cover lot, estimated to bring $20-30 million, was no surprise: In a spirited and well argued session, the judge grilled the lawyers on the following three issues, according to ODonnell, whose clients were two members and one former member of the museum: The first hour of questioning explored whether ODonnells plaintiffs and those in the other lawsuit, who include descendants of artist Norman Rockwell, have standing. (The judge had decided to merge the two court challenges into one hearing.) Next, the judge sought testimony showing that the plaintiffs were likely to prevail in making a convincing case against the art salesa necessary condition for granting a temporary restraining order or preliminary injunction. The judge asked Courtney Aladro, chief of the AGs Division of Public Charities, to delineate what standards the trustees should be held to, recounted ODonnell. The judge asked, What did the museum do wrong? Finally, the judge sought testimony on whether interim harm would be caused by a delay in the sales and whether there would be irreparable damage if the works ultimately were sold. Both ODonnell and Michael Keating, the Rockwells attorney, told me that the judge didnt tip his hand as to how he was likely to rule. His decision is expected to be issued in advance of the Nov. 13 American art auction, in which the most important of the museums offerings are scheduled to go on the block. For a more detailed, flavorful firsthand account of the hearing, see Andrew Russeths report for ARTnews. ODonnell told me that the judge seemed very interested in what the Attorney General thought. We already know a lot about that from the brief she filed on Monday. Parnass reports that rather than seek another hearing, the Attorney Generals Office asks that the court view the brief it filed Monday as sufficient to serve as a request for the same injunctive relief.' Embedded in that brief are a few bombshells. But to my non-professional legal mind, theres one crucial element thats missing from the various filings. More on this soon. Cambodia is strategically located in the heart of Southeast Asia. The country is bordered by Thailand, Laos, and Vietnam, and has the Gulf of Thailand to its south-west. The country is popular for providing a low-cost manufacturing base for several industries. Among the many advantages that the country offers to investors are duty-free access to some large and developed markets, a stable economy, and several government incentives. Additionally, there are several special economic zones exclusively established to promote manufacturing across the country. In this article, we briefly discuss the chief characteristics of the garment manufacturing industry in Cambodia and the advantages it offers to foreign investors. Cambodias garment manufacturing industry a key driver of growth Cambodias garment manufacturing industry is largely export-oriented and highly integrated into global supply chains. The European Union (EU) represents the largest market for Cambodian garment exports, accounting for approximately 40 percent of the total manufacturing, followed by the United States ( 30 percent), Canada (9 percent), and Japan (4 percent). Many companies in the country operate as contract manufacturers for major multinational brands such as Adidas, Gap, H&M, Marks & Spencer, and Uniqlo. In the early 1990s, the Cambodian government took various measures to boost the industrys competitiveness in the international market, which prompted foreign investors to direct their attention to the country. Additionally, the countrys industrial development was supported by the Multi-Fiber Arrangements (MFA) quotas and other preferential trade agreements implemented by developed countries like the US and EU. Two decades later, the garment industry continues to drive the Cambodian economy through human capital development, employment generation and foreign direct investment (FDI). Currently, the industry employees over 600,000 people, making the sector the biggest employer in the country. Further, the garment industry accounts for 16 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) and 80 percent of Cambodias export earnings. In 2016, the total number of garment factories in the country stood at 589 factories. Cut-make-trim model Cambodias garment factories are generally based on the principle of cut-make-trim (CMT) model. Under this method of production, the raw material, machinery and the design of the garments are imported from abroad, while the assembly of the product is outsourced to the labor-intensive factories in Cambodia. The CMT implies cutting and sewing of material according to the clothing brands specifications. The garment industry is essentially dominated by foreign owned firms, mainly from the neighboring countries such as China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia and Republic of Korea. The association with foreign-owned garments firms or brand names provide Cambodias garments industry an important channel into the garments global value chain. Low-skilled workforce The garment industry in Cambodia is essentially based on low-skilled, labor-intensive activities. Cambodia has a significant proportion of its population living below the poverty line with low levels of education. As a result, the country has a large pool of low-cost, and low-skilled workers. The vast majority of workers employed in the garment factories are women with minimum skills. Only a small proportion of the workforce includes higher skilled workers and professionals; these are mostly managers, supervisors, or members of the operations department. Geographical distribution Over 60 percent of Cambodias garment factories are located within or in close proximity to the capital city Phnom Penh. The finished products are transported from the factories in Phnom Penh by train to the seaport of Sihanoukville where the garments are shipped to other countries. Other key locations of garment factories are Kompong Som, Kompong Speu, Kompong Cham, Kompong Chhnang, Svay Rieng, Takeav and Kandal provinces. Advantages of Cambodia Strategic location Cambodia is strategically located in the center of the east-west corridor of the Greater Mekong Sub-region (GMS), providing access to key world markets. This helps businesses take advantage of low-cost manufacturing in Cambodia as well as huge demand for its products in Asia. Competitive labor force Labor in Cambodia is cheaper than most regional competitors, except Laos and Myanmar. In 2017, Cambodias monthly minimum wage of workers in its garment industry increased to US$153, a double of the 2012 level. Yet, the countrys monthly minimum wage remains the most competitive when compared to Thailand (US$250) or Vietnam (US$166). Preferential market access Cambodia is a member of the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) a regional economic integration pact wherein Cambodia benefits from the Common Effective Preferential Tariff (CEPT) agreement that reduces or eliminates tariffs on the manufactured goods traded between the 10 ASEAN member countries. The rapidly integrating ASEAN makes Cambodia an attractive investment destination because of its low-cost manufacturing, large regional markets and easier sourcing of raw material within the ASEAN Economic Community. Cambodia has also been a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) since 2004; this has increased its trade integration with the US and the EU. Cambodia benefits from the EUs Everything but Arms Scheme (EBA), which allows low developing countries such as Cambodia duty-free access to the EUs market for all export goods. The EU has however, in October 2018, announced that it has launched the procedures for the withdrawal of Cambodias benefits under EBA over the countrys allegedly poor human rights record. According to the EU, Cambodian exports might lose their duty free access to the EU market unless significant improvements are made on the human rights front. Europen diplomats have indicated that it will take at least one year for a final decision to be made. Supportive government policies Some of the many incentives offered by the government of Cambodia include 100 percent foreign equity ownership, tax holidays of up to 9 years, and exemption from import duty on machinery and equipment. In addition to that, Investors can repatriate profit freely and reinvestment of earnings is encouraged with special depreciation allowances. Conclusion Over the years, Cambodia has had a steady flow of foreign investment in its garment manufacturing industry demonstrating the many opportunities that the country offers to its foreign investors. Though certain challenges remain while doing business in a developing country like Cambodia such as infrastructural gaps, and high energy costs the considerable competitive advantages that the country offers cannot be ignored. Editors Note: This article was first published on November 8, 2017 and is updated on November 1, 2018, as per latest developments. 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Squire Patton Boggs Australia has advised on the acquisition of three hotels by Elanor Investors Groups (ENN) Elanor Metro and Prime Regional Hotel Fund (EMPR).The team was led by Sydney-based partner, hospitality and real estate specialist, Rahul Parrab and banking and finance partner Hai-Dang Nguyen, who joined the firm recently.They were supported by Greg de Mesquita (senior associate), Kevin Lee (associate) and Hugh Pilkington (associate).The lender was advised by a team from DLA Piper led by partner Hugo Thistlewood.Finding and retaining the right talent, and the use of technology, have been identified as the two biggest challenges for law firms in the coming years.For talent, it is likely that competition for the best people will intensify with lateral hires seen as the best opportunity by law firm senior partners and leaders survey for the annual Smith & Williamson report.To attract and retain the best people (72% highlighted this as the top challenge) firms should use both financial and non-financial incentives.They must also ensure that trainees are equipped with the right skills to meet client demands. These skills will include the use of technology, which is seen as a fast-growing challenge for law firms.Adopting new tech was a key challenge cited by 51% of respondents with artificial intelligence seen as the biggest opportunity and cyber security the biggest challenge.Investment in technology is also seen as a key opportunity taking second spot to focusing on specialist sectors.As the report focuses on UK leaders, the responses reflect the backdrop of Brexit and the challenges that will bring.A new module for lawyers working in the energy sector has been launched by LexisNexis.The content and tech firm has created LexisPSL Energy as part of a focus on providing solutions by industry sector as well as practice group. Coverage of the new resource spans the electricity and upstream, midstream and downstream oil and gas arenas."We are listening to our customers and innovating. As sector focus becomes the most prevalent way of doing business, lawyers need to arm themselves with sector knowledge to stay up to date and understand their clients businesses, commented Nicola Johns, Head of LexisPSLs Built Environment group. ABS Built on the BMW K 1600 B, the Grand America adds more comfort and convenience through exclusive equipment and visual queues, making long trips easier, be it alone or riding with a passenger.The most striking addition is the top case, which is inspired by U.S. custom bikes and comes with an additional brake light that matches the ones integrated in the side cases. The top case is complete with a comfy pillion back rest, and can be further customized with arm rests.Another important addition is the standard higher windshield, which aids in creating a bubble of calm air for the passengers to reduce fatigue and wind noise, translating into more saddle time and less stops for resting.As with the K 1600 B, the Grand America is offered as standard in Blackstorm metallic color setup, but the new Style Package that was specially created for the latter makes the bike really stand out through a two-color finish combining Blackstorm metallic with Austin Yellow metallic, as well as chrome inserts.The list of standard items continues with the awesome electronic suspension Dynamic ESA offering Road and Cruise settings, the electric reverse assist system and highway footboards, which allow for a more relaxed feet-forward position on boring straight roads.But thats not all, as youll also benefit from engine protection bars,Pro, Dynamic Traction Control, xenon headlight, heated grips and seat, cruise control, BMW Motorrads Multi-Controller, three riding modes, and an audio system.Pretty much everything you need, if you ask me, but this can be further extended through optional features like adaptive turning lights, daytime running lights, Keyless Ride, Hill Start Control, central locking, forged wheels, chrome-plated mirror cases, sat-nav, and a lot more.The new BMW K 1600 Grand America will reach dealers sometime next year and will probably cost about three grand more than the standard bagger. We are very curious to see how does it stack up against the all-new Honda Gold Wing FYI I won't be joining the guys on @thegrandtour 2nd season - I wish them all the luck. My character wasn't developed as I was told. Mike Skinner (@MSTheGunslinger) November 7, 2017 and I agree with many of you that it sucked - if you're gonna wear Evil Knievel's firesuit, you need to be Evil Flipping Knievel! Peace out Mike Skinner (@MSTheGunslinger) November 7, 2017 by the way...I enjoyed some of those cars I got to drive & I don't really hate the brits. See yall @fosgoodwood @GoodwoodRRC Mike Skinner (@MSTheGunslinger) November 7, 2017 As it happens, Skinners role in The Grand Tour didnt work out as Jeremy, Richard, James, and executive producer Andy Wilman were expecting. Fans of the show took to Amazon Prime to complain about the forced persona of The American, and for what its worth, stereotyping is best reserved to Hollywood.At this point, its not known how the production team talked Skinner out of the show, but one thing is for certain. According to the man himself, I wont be joining the guts on @thegrandtour 2nd season . The reason for Skinners departure is that his character wasnt developed as I was told. Reading between the lines, someone on the production team didnt think The American through, obnoxiously stereotypical American chatter behind the wheel and all.More intriguingly, Skinner agrees with many of us his role sucked. On the upside, I enjoyed some of those cars I got to drive. To understand how unconvincing the character was made to be for comedic purposes, those of you who havent watched The Grand Tour yet must know that The American hates non- V8 cars.It remains to be seen who will replace the stock car racing driver on the show for the second season, which will premiere on Amazon Prime on December 8, 2017. As ever, look forward to three middle-aged men arguing and rampaging around the world in the most exclusive cars on sale today. Oh, and by the way, theres something you need to know about the green tent . And that is, the studio tent is no longer engaged in a grand tour of the world. The ride-sharing giant made a very important announcement today which, for a change, had nothing to do with the CEO resigning or the outbreak of another racial discrimination scandal . Instead, it was an agreement signed with a certain U.S. agency you might have heard of before: NASA.The two have apparently put their signatures on a Space Act Agreement that will see them develop Unmanned Aerial Systems (or UAS) and an Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM) system together, which will eventually enable Uber to launch its air passenger transportation business.The company first talked about the ELEVATE project - its plan to build a "flying car" - last year, but it was all very sketchy and vague. With this new development presented at the WebSummit in Lisbon, the uberAIR initiative is starting to catch shape. So much so, in fact, that they claim to have a pilot version of its aerial taxi service up and running by 2020.Uber used to occasion to launch a short clip presenting what the entire experience should be like. It would appear a few select buildings would host uberAIR Skyports on their roofs where people could go to have them picked up by their VTOL. The rides would be shared with others (the aircraft in the video appears to have four seats) which would make sense considering there is a limited number of destinations, so a few are bound to overlap.Even though the press release talks of Unmanned Aerial Systems, the clip shows vehicles that are still piloted by humans. Not the same can be said about the Volvo XC90 waiting for the protagonist at her destination, which appears to be equipped with self-driving technology.Ubers head of product, Jeff Holden (complete interview embedded below) used this occasion to announce the addition of another city - the third - to the list where the pilot program would have its first runs. The three are Dubai, Dallas-Fort Worth and the last to join the party, Los Angeles.There are still a lot of unknowns about Uber's success with this new direction of its business, and it's easy to understand why some people don't think it will ever take off. For one, the last thing a busy city needs is rich people flying around in their noisy aircraft and landing on top of their building.But if any of the companies currently involved in the development of VTOLs is to succeed, we'd put our money on Uber. It seems to have the most coherent plan, and it definitely doesn't lack motivation. Now it has NASA's backing as well, so as long as it can leave its problems in the past, your Uber ride might turn into your Uber flight come 2020. Two years after his girlfriend Alison Parker was shot and killed during a live TV newscast, Chris Hurst was elected as a Democrat to Virginia's House of Delegates, flipping a Blacksburg seat. Hurst wrote earlier this year that he was quitting journalism to focus on the issues he and Parker "most value," and honor her legacy. While gun safety groups donated to Hurst's campaign, he did not make it an issue in the race, according to The Roanoke Times. Danica Roem, a transgender woman, was elected to the Virginia House of Delegates Tuesday. She defeated incumbent Robert Marshall who, in 2006, referred to himself as the state's "chief homophobe" and, earlier this year, introduced a "bathroom bill" pertaining to transgender individuals, per the Washington Post. Roem will be one of the very few transgender elected officials in the nation. The first openly transgender person to hold office was Althea Garrison, elected as a Republican to the Massachusetts House of Representatives in 1992. Roem is also one of several Democrats who unseated Republicans in races for the Virginia state legislature, a shocking outcome that could see Democrats become the majority party in the chamber. Go deeper: Democrat Ralph Northam wins the race for Virginia governor An octogenarians fixation with running against Deuba Why does someone run for election? To win would be the obvious answer, but not for this octogenarian from Dadeldhura. The Justice Department has dropped a case against a woman who was arrested after laughing during Jeff Sessions' confirmation hearing, per the Huffington Post. Desiree Fairooz was convicted in May of "disorderly or disruptive conduct," but a judge tossed that conviction. She was set to go on trial again next week, but prosecutors dropped the charges on Monday. Fairooz laughed after GOP Sen. Richard Shelby said during the hearing that Sessions had a "clear" record of "treating all Americans equally under the law." She then shouted that Sessions was "evil" as she was being removed from the courtroom by Capitol Police. The Affordable Care Act's Medicaid expansion was a big winner tonight: Voters in Maine approved a ballot measure to participate in the expansion, and Democrats' significant gains in Virginia improved the odds it will expand the program, too. What's next: Although Maine voters signed off on Medicaid expansion last night, some advocates expect Gov. Paul LePage to drag his feet until he leaves office next year, pushing the actual implementation of tonight's referendum to his successor. In Virginia, Democrats' romp through the House of Delegates where the policy died under Gov. Terry McAuliffe will make Medicaid expansion significantly more likely. LePage says the legislature will have to fund the expansion first. Photo: Robert F. Bukaty / AP Not so fast, Maine voters. Gov. Paul LePage says his administration wont expand Medicaid until the state legislature funds it, after the state voted last night to broaden the program under the Affordable Care Act, per the Bangor Daily News. The bottom line: Its not surprising that LePage would pump the brakes, since he vetoed Medicaid expansion five times. But the voters overruled him last night, so even if the state doesnt expand Medicaid now, it will eventually. Former Yahoo CEO Marissa Meyer, whose 5-year tenure at Yahoo was shaken by online breaches of user data, placing it at the top of the list of largest data breaches ever, told lawmakers Wednesday that she wants to "sincerely apologize to each and every one of our users," per CBS News. Verizon, which recently acquired most of Yahoo, revealed last month the 2013 breach affected all 3 billion Yahoo user accounts, not just 1 billion as was originally disclosed in December last year. Stuffed animals sit at the base of a cross at a makeshift memorial for victims near the scene of the Texas shooting. Photo: Eric Gay / AP 26 people, many of whom belong to the tight-knit community of Sutherland Springs, Texas, were killed Sunday after Devin Kelley walked into the First Baptist Church with an assault rifle. About half of the victims killed were children, including one who was only a year old. One family alone lost 8 people, including a pregnant woman and her unborn child. Of the 26 killed, 23 were found dead inside the church, while two people were found outside, per TIME. One person died at a local hospital. Below are the names and descriptions of those who have been confirmed dead, with links to more information. The victims: The Holcombe family, which lost 8 members: The gubernatorial standoff between Democrat Ralph Northam and Republican Ed Gillespie may be taking national headlines today, but another race worth paying attention to down-ballot pits incumbent Democrat Attorney General Mark Herring against Republican federal prosecutor and military veteran John Adams to be Virginia's attorney general. Why we're paying attention: Attorneys general across the country, including Herring himself, have been playing a big role in countering Trump's policies this year, in particular the various iterations of the travel ban. And in the last several years, Virginia has been at the center of some national debates, including same sex marriage his refusal to back Virginia's ban on same sex marriage elevated the issue to the Supreme Court and effectively legalized same sex marriage nationwide. How the polling plays: Roanoke College had Herring and Adams tied last week 46-46. The Republican Attorneys General Association Communications Director, Zack Roday, told Axios his team wasn't surprised at the tightening poll numbers. "We always knew this could be a close race," Roday said. The wild card in the race: Whether this is a referendum on Trump. And per the Democratic Attorneys General Association's Executive Director, Sean Rankin, "there are certainly people in Virginia who oppose the president strongly," but "I don't think that accounts for the universe of people who will vote." How the race is changing the calculus: There's been a shift in spending trends national organizations for both parties have dropped a "gentleman's agreement" to not spend to unseat an incumbent. It likely won't just be Virginia that takes the gloves off, Rankin tells Axios. He predicts an uptick in spending in 2018 for A.G. races nationwide, which "will be the real trend across the country...whether or not it's a challenge to an incumbent or an open seat." There are 31 A.G. races next year. New Jersey Democrat Phil Murphy (L) and Virginia Democrat Ralph Northam (R), who each won gubernatorial races last night. Photos: Julio Cortez, Cliff Owen / AP For the first time since Election Night one year ago today, Democrats could smile. On a day that set the opening tone for the midterm elections of 2018, voters rejected President Trump, handed Democrats a big win in a swing state in a racially charged moment, and provided hope however fleeting or fanciful that they can win back power in Washington. Sound smart: It's tempting to read too much into off-year elections. And, given both Virginia and New Jersey are states Hillary Clinton won, they by all measures should have gone to Democrats. But don't underestimate how much unity, momentum, money will now flow to Democrats and how much finger-pointing and funk they avoided. In the Virginia governor's race, Democrat Ralph Northam beat Ed Gillespie by 9 points a far bigger margin than either party had foreseen, and far wider than Hillary Clinton's win over Trump. Some empirical data behind the hope: The stunning margin was booked largely in Northern Virginia, in what MSNBC's Steve Kornacki called "the revenge of the suburbs" after a year of Trump. U.Va.'s Larry Sabato told me there's one explanation: "Donald Trump. He really is deeply unpopular in urban-suburban Virginia. Voter after voter wanted to send him a message, and said so. Of course, he won't listen, but the message was sent." Gillespie lost women by 22 percentage points. He won men by 2 percentage points. Gillespie won whites by 15 percentage points, and still got crushed. Northam won by a 24 point margin among those who decided in last week. It looks like those racially tinged ads/moves backfired. And it wasn't just Northam: In what the Richmond Times-Dispatch called a "tsunami election," Democrats erase a 32-seat GOP advantage in the House of Delegates, with recounts likely to determine control. Plus national history: "Virginia's most socially conservative state lawmaker was ousted from office ... by Danica Roem, a Democrat who will be one of the nation's first openly transgender elected officials and who embodies much of what Del. Robert G. Marshall fought against in Richmond." (WashPost) A white mayor won by the largest margin in decades in predominantly black Detroit. The first African American Democratic woman was elected mayor of Charlotte. A Democrat will replace Chris Christie in New Jersey. A Democrat knocked off a GOP incumbent in New Hampshire's largest city to become Manchester's first female mayor. "Voters in Maine ... easily approved a referendum to expand Medicaid for low-income adults, doing an end-run around Republican Gov. Paul LePage, who vetoed the move a key element of Obamacare." (NPR) A big story that could get lost in the blizzard: Two more House Republicans Rep. Frank LoBiondo of New Jersey and Rep. Ted Poe of Texas announced their retirements, increasing chances Dems take the House a year from now. The takeaways: Top Republicans were stunned by the severity of the shellacking, and worry that it will endanger both tax reform and the House majority. 8 November 2017 17:39 (UTC+04:00) By Rashid Shirinov The state debt of Armenia continues to grow at a rapid pace, and now there is a possibility that the government will have to raise the bar of the critical level of state debt earlier than previously expected. A month ago, the Armenian authorities assured that this was not going to happen and the bar could be upgraded only next year, if necessary. However, the situation has worsened. Zhamanak newspaper reports that the government intends to amend the law on state debt before the end of the year. Under the amendment, Armenia will be able to attract more debt if needed. Under the current law, the state debt of Armenia cannot exceed 60 percent of GDP, but this bar will most likely be overcome by the end of this year. In particular, loans will be needed in case of a military situation or global and regional economic crises that may affect the country. As of the end of August this year, Armenias state debt amounted to $6.259 billion. The National Statistical Service of Armenia notes that the public debt grew by about $58 million in August alone. Thus, Armenias debt is increasing monthly, but the well-being of the countrys population is not improving. One third of Armenia lives in poverty, according to statistics, and this indicator has not been decreasing for many years. In addition, the unemployment rate in Armenia is the highest in the CIS area. This year we see underfulfillment and we are borrowing more than planned. This is a policy that turns into a deplorable practice and continues, regardless of what is declared at the ministerial level, economist Vilen Khachatryan has told Aravot.am. Recently, Armenian Finance Minister Vardan Aramyan said that the country will end the year with a state debt of $6.7 billion. Answering the question if it is possible that next year the public debt will cross the threshold of $7 billion, the minister said that this is quite possible. Thus, the state debt of Armenia was slightly above $3 billion in 2009, but now the figure rapidly approaches $7 billion. Although the state debt is growing every month, this does not affect the well-being of the population in a positive way. How long should people tolerate this? --- Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 7 November 2017 14:56 (UTC+04:00) By Rashid Shirinov Armenia tried to prevent the attraction of loans for the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars (BTK) railway project, Azerbaijans Finance Minister Samir Sharifov said on November 7. He made the remarks at a meeting of five parliamentary committees for discussing the draft state and consolidated budgets for 2018. The minister noted that this explains why international financial institutions did not allocate loans for this project. The reason is not that international financial organizations consider BTK inefficient, but that our ill-intentioned neighbor tried to prevent the implementation of the project, said Sharifov. In this regard, added Sharifov, the Azerbaijani President decided that the project will be financed from the countrys funds. A solemn opening ceremony of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway was held at the Baku International Sea Port on October 30. The ceremony was attended by the presidents, heads of government and delegations of Azerbaijan, Turkey, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan. The large-scale project was constructed on the basis of a Georgian-Azerbaijani-Turkish intergovernmental agreement. In future, the railways peak capacity will be 17 million tons of cargo per year. At an initial stage, this figure will be one million passengers and 6.5 million tons of cargo. Obviously, the fact that Armenia was left out of this big regional project of Azerbaijan, Turkey and Georgia has angered the Armenian authorities, who therefore decided to interfere with the construction of the project in all possible ways. However, Armenia's plan has failed as the railway is today fully operational. The Azerbaijani side has previously warned that Armenias joining the BTK railway is possible only after the settlement of the long-standing Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. --- Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 10:11 (UTC+04:00) By Trend Over the past 24 hours, Armenias armed forces have 130 times violated the ceasefire along the line of contact between Azerbaijani and Armenian troops, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry said on November 8. Armenians were using large-caliber machine guns. 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. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Attempt at one-party rule: Nidhi Nepali Congress leader Bimalendra Nidhi, who is contesting the federal parliamentary polls from Dhanusha-3, has accused the alliance of the CPN-UML and the CPN (Maoist Centre) of trying to impose an authoritarian communist rule in the country. 8 November 2017 16:20 (UTC+04:00) By Rashid Shirinov These days the Armenian National Assembly is discussing the draft budget of the country for 2018, and news that the Armenian media share from there mainly upset the countrys population. During the preliminary discussion of the draft budget, Armenias Deputy Minister of Finance Atom Janjugazyan said that the budget for the next year provides to allocate 80.1 billion drams ($165 million) for the Ministry of Healthcare. This is by almost 5.8 billion drams ($12 million) less than the money allocated for the ministry in 2017. Services rendered to the beneficiaries will not deteriorate, on the contrary with a small budget it is possible to achieve great success, Janjugazyan said. However, Hakob Hakobyan, the chairman of the Committee on Health Care and Social Affairs of the National Assembly, did not agree with him, noting that there are many problems in healthcare that need to be solved. We have so many problems in this sphere that need to be solved, so, the reduction of 5.8 billion is wrong logically, Hakobyan said. Then, MP from the ARF faction Armenuyu Kyureghyan also noted that the money allocated for the Ministry of Healthcare is too little. Some 3.3 billion drams ($6.8 million) are envisaged for the purchase of medicines, and only 10 million drams ($20,600) for the purchase of equipment. Is it correct to allocate so little money for medical equipment? she asked. Obviously, the reduction in financing the healthcare in Armenia is linked to the problems with the state budget that the Armenian government faces. For this reason, the authorities have previously decided to cut financing of the education sector. Naturally, this resulted in reduction in the number of schools and teachers in Armenia. The government calls this process optimization, but people are well aware that the problem is the lack of funds in the state budget. In the coming years, the financing of education in Armenia will be reduced from 3.2 percent (in 2016) to only 1.85 percent (in 2020) of the countrys GDP. This year, Armenias education spending was 2.34 percent of the GDP. For some incomprehensible reason, the Armenian government decides to increase defense spending in 2018, but to reduce it for the healthcare and education one of the most important sectors for the Armenian population. Obviously, the reduction of funding healthcare will lead to the decline in staff numbers and even closure of health facilities. Thus, life for Armenians in their country will soon become even more burdensome. --- Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 13:41 (UTC+04:00) ByMark Leonard Over the last few weeks, media around the world have been saturated with stories about how technology is destroying politics. In autocracies like China, the fear is of ultra-empowered Big Brother states, like that in George Orwells 1984. In democracies like the United States, the concern is that tech companies will continue to exacerbate political and social polarization by facilitating the spread of disinformation and creating ideological filter bubbles, leading to something resembling Aldous Huxleys Brave New World. In fact, by bringing about a convergence between democracy and dictatorship, new technologies render both of these dystopian visions impossible. But that doesnt mean that there is nothing to fear. Much of the coverage of the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) focused on President Xi Jinpings consolidation of power. He is, observers warn, creating an information-age dictatorship, in which the technologies that were once expected to bring freedom to Chinas 1.4 billion citizens have instead enabled him to entrench his own authority. By providing the government with highly detailed information on the needs, feelings, and aspirations of ordinary Chinese, the Internet allows Chinas leaders to preempt discontent. In other words, they now use Big Data, rather than brute force, to ensure stability. And the data are big indeed. More than 170 million face-recognition surveillance cameras track every step citizens make. An artificial-intelligence-enhanced security system can spot criminal suspects as they cycle beside a lake or purchase dumplings from a street vendor, and immediately alert the police. Data surveillance cameras feed into Chinas social credit data bank, where the regime compiles thick files on its peoples creditworthiness, consumption patterns, and overall reliability. The CPC is also using technology to manage its own ranks, having developed dozens of apps to communicate with party members. Meanwhile, it blocks some of the empowering features of technology: by forcing all tech companies to have their servers within China, it effectively in-sources censorship. The impact of technology on American politics has been even more visible, but it is analyzed in terms of the market, rather than the state. Among the most eye-catching stories has been the role that fake news played in shaping last years presidential election. Facebook has admitted that 126 million Americans might have seen fake news during the campaign. More recently, Special Counsel Robert Mueller, who is conducting an investigation into whether US President Donald Trumps campaign colluded with Russias interference in the 2016 election, charged one-time campaign chairman Paul Manafort with 12 counts including conspiracy against the United States for his actions prior to the campaign. A foreign policy adviser to the Trump campaign, George Papadopoulos, was also indicted for lying to the FBI about meetings with individuals closely associated with the Russian government during the campaign, though he has already pleaded guilty and has been cooperating with investigators since the summer. But beyond such bombshell developments is a broader anxiety about the ability of tech companies to control the information people receive. With Big Techs secret algorithms determining how we perceive the world, it is becoming increasingly difficult for people to make conscious decisions what philosophers perceive as the basic dimension of free will. Big tech companies, worth more than some countries GDP, seek to maximize profits, not social welfare. Yet, at a time when attention is supplanting money as the most valuable commodity, the impact of their decisions is far-reaching. James Williams, a Google engineer turned academic, argues that the digital age has unleashed fierce competition for our attention, and few have benefited more than Trump, who is for the Internet what Ronald Reagan was for television. At the same time, the impact of technology on politics is relatively independent of regime type. Technology is blurring the comforting distinction between open and closed societies, and between planned and free economies, ultimately making it impossible for either to exist in its ideal form. By revealing the US National Security Administrations massive government surveillance, Edward Snowden made clear that the states desire for omniscience is not limited to China. On the contrary, it is central to the idea of national security in the US. In China, things are moving in the opposite direction. To be sure, the Chinese government is pressuring the biggest tech companies to give it a direct role in corporate decision-making and direct access to their data. At the same time, however, the Internet is changing the nature of Chinese politics and the Chinese economy, pushing both to become more responsive to consumer needs. For example, a friend who worked for the search engine Baidu explained to me how the company tries to enhance the consumer experience of censorship, testing the ways in which people prefer to be censored. Jack Ma of tech giant Alibaba thinks that China can use Big Data to design perfectly calibrated state interventions that enable it to outperform free-market economies. In the coming decades, Ma believes, the planned economy will get bigger and bigger. In the digital age, the biggest danger is not that technology will put free and autocratic societies increasingly at odds with one another. It is that the worst fears of both Orwell and Huxley will become manifest in both types of system, creating a different kind of dystopia. With many of their deepest desires being met, citizens will have the illusion of freedom and empowerment. In reality, their lives, the information they consume, and the choices they make will be determined by algorithms and platforms controlled by unaccountable corporate or government elites. Copyright: Project Syndicate: The Illusion of Freedom in the Digital Age -- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 09:56 (UTC+04:00) By Trend Turkey is ready to begin construction of the second track on the countrys section of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars (BTK) railway, a source in the Turkish Ministry of Transport, Maritime Affairs and Communications told Trend. The main goal is to increase the volume of cargo transportation from 6.5 million tons per year to 17 million tons, then to 25 million tons and subsequently to 50 million tons per year, the source noted. "The launch of the second railway track will make it possible to achieve the goals on increasing the volume of cargo transportation," the source added. The official opening ceremony of the BTK railway was held in Baku Oct.30. The BTK railway was constructed on the basis a Georgian-Azerbaijani-Turkish intergovernmental agreement. The railways peak capacity will be 17 million tons of cargo per year. At an initial stage, this figure will be one million passengers and 6.5 million tons of cargo. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 11:23 (UTC+04:00) By Trend The Chamber of Accounts of Azerbaijan should audit 500 million manats allocated to the Azerbaijan Deposit Insurance Fund (ADIF), said the Azerbaijani MPs. The MPs noted that about 43,000 depositors of Bank Standard have not been able to return more than 150 million manats so far. The MPs also said that they receive hundreds of complaints from the depositors of the bank in connection with this problem. In 2016, the Central Bank of Azerbaijan allocated a loan worth 500 million manats to ADIF for paying compensations to depositors of closed banks in the country. Eleven banks went bankrupt in Azerbaijan since 2016. According to ADIF, compensations worth 750 million manats have been paid to the clients of these banks, including almost 440 million manats paid to Bank Standard depositors. (1.7003 manats = 1 USD on Nov. 7) --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 10:53 (UTC+04:00) By Sara Israfilbayova The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), providing project finance for industries and businesses, expects Azerbaijans economy to grow 2 percent in 2018. An updated Regional Economic Prospects report says that the start of gas production within the Shah Deniz-2 project will support the growth of Azerbaijans economy next year. The Shah Deniz, discovered in 1999, is one of the worlds largest gas-condensate fields, which reserves are estimated at 1.2 trillion cubic meters of gas. The field is located on the deep water shelf of the Caspian Sea, 70 km south-east of Baku, in water depths ranging from 50 to 500 m. Shah Deniz field's Shah Deniz-2 is a giant project that will add a further 16 billion cubic meters per year (bcma) of gas production to the approximately 9 bcma produced by Shah Deniz Stage 1. One of the largest gas developments in the world, the field will help increase European energy security by bringing Caspian gas resources to markets in Europe for the very first time. Shah Deniz gas will travel 3,500 kilometres, to elevations of over 2,500 metres, and over 800 metres below the sea. As for this year, the banks analysts expect Azerbaijans economy to shrink 0.5 percent. The EBRD has kept its expectations regarding the development of the countrys economy as in the banks May report. Growth in eastern Europe and the Caucasus as a whole is expected to pick up from near zero to close to 1.5 percent in 2017 as headwinds from low commodity prices and the earlier recession in Russia subside, said the report. A gradual recovery in the region is set to continue in 2018. The EBRDs forecast for 2018 exceeds expectations of Azerbaijani government. The Azerbaijani government expects Azerbaijans real GDP to grow 1.5 percent in 2018. For 2017, the government expects the countrys economy to grow 0.3 percent. The EBRD is an international financial institution founded in 1991. The bank has allocated about 2.8 billion to Azerbaijan for implementation of 161 projects since 1992. One of the main priorities of the EBRD in Azerbaijan for 2017 is support the local corporate with direct financing. The institute continues to pursue investments in energy projects, especially where there is a gap to improve efficiency and energy security. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 13:05 (UTC+04:00) By Trend A business meeting between entrepreneurs of Azerbaijan and Bosnia and Herzegovina will be held in Baku on November 15, the Azerbaijan Export and Investment Promotion Foundation (AZPROMO) said in a message on November 8. According to the message, the meeting will be held during the visit of the delegation of Bosnia and Herzegovinas businessmen to Azerbaijan. The representatives of Bosnia and Herzegovinas companies specializing in various industries will attend the meeting. The data of the Azerbaijani State Customs Committee shows that the trade turnover between Azerbaijan and Bosnia and Herzegovina was more than $662,000 in January-September 2017. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 20:00 (UTC+04:00) By Trend Azerbaijans National Fund for Entrepreneurship Support has provided businessmen in Baku and surrounding settlements with preferential loans worth 188 million manats for construction of 58 modern greenhouses so far, the Azerbaijani Ministry of Economy said in a statement on November 8. Azerbaijans National Fund for Entrepreneurship Support held a business forum in Azerbaijans Aghsu district Nov. 8, and about 90 entrepreneurs of the district took part in the forum. Speaking at the event, Shirzad Abdullayev, executive director of the fund, noted that in general, entrepreneurs of the Mountainous Shirvan economic region received preferential loans worth 69.6 million manats from the fund. Entrepreneurs of the region have also received preferential loans worth 516,000 manats within the framework of todays forum, he added. These funds will be directed to projects in the crop production, livestock, horticulture, beekeeping, tobacco growing and other spheres. Abdullayev said that so far, businessmen of the Aghsu district, which is a part of the Mountainous Shirvan economic region, have been granted preferential loans worth 18.2 million manats. Azerbaijans National Fund for Entrepreneurship Support plans to allocate 150 million manats in 2017. Azerbaijans National Fund for Entrepreneurship Support was established in 1992. (1.7003 manats = 1 USD on Nov. 8) --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 16:53 (UTC+04:00) By Laman Ismayilova A casting for national contest of top models - "Miss Top Model Azerbaijan-2018" will be held in Baku. The event will take place in Switch Club / Venezia in Baku on November 12, at 15:00, Trend Life reported. The organizers said that participants of Miss Top Model Azerbaijan can be both beginners and experienced models - girls who have already conquered podiums and were awarded. During the contest, models should be in cocktail dress and high-heeled shoes. Notably, the final of "Miss Top Model Azerbaijan-2017" took place in on June 17. The first place went to Jeyhuna Aliyeva. As in the past year, contest participants will be awarded with valuable prizes. The models have a chance to enter the world of national fashion industry. In addition, the holder of the title "Miss Top Model Azerbaijan-2018" will have the opportunity to represent Azerbaijan at the international contest "Miss Top Model of the World". Send your application here: http://www.misstopmodel.az/form. Applications are accepted until November 10. For more information, please contact: +99470 220 01 74 (WhatsApp); +99450 228 99 91. Media partners of the event are Trend.az, Day.az, Milli.az, Azernews.az --- Laman Ismayilova is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Lam_Ismayilova Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 14:18 (UTC+04:00) By Amina Nazarli Azerbaijani ophthalmologist will finally start to perform corneal transplant surgeries, world's most frequent type of transplantation to replace the cornea with tissue from a donor. The permission became positively soul-enriching for thousands of patients in the country who need transplant of the cornea to see the world with new eye. The surgeries will start to perform in the coming weeks at the Zarifa Aliyeva National Ophthalmology Center, said Farah Abdulaliyeva, leading researcher at the Center. More than 3,000 patients, waiting for corneal transplantation, have been registered at the National Ophthalmology Center, she said, adding that 20 percent of them are children. Abdullayeva said that at first, cornea will be transplanted to the patients who need urgent surgery. National doctors have long been ready to transplant these tissues, but were limited because of a ban in the Customs Code. The cornea can be removed only in the corpse. Azerbaijan approved the law on seizure of organs from a corpse, but needed the mechanism of realization of the process. The long-awaited permission realized after the presidential decree on November 3 permitted the import of cornea into Azerbaijan. Neighboring countries Iran and Russia already have eye banks. In these banks cornea is removed from the corpses and the transplantation is free for their citizens, while the biomaterial is sold for other countries. Abdulaliyeva stressed that cornea is planned to be imported to the country from the U.S., Iran and Russia. Negotiations were held and an agreement was reached with donor banks from U.S., Iran and Russia, she said. In the coming weeks, the eye cornea will be imported into Azerbaijan. So far, Azerbaijani citizens had to go to Turkey, Iran or Russia for corneal transplant surgery that cost them a lot of money and energy. A patient undergoing surgery abroad should undergo medical examination after some time -- from six to 12 months. Corneal eye disease is the fourth most common cause of blindness, after cataracts, glaucoma and age-related macular degeneration, and affects more than 10 million people worldwide. As for 2014, over 65,000 corneal transplants are being performed worldwide annually. The cornea is the clear outer lens on the front of the eye. A corneal transplant is surgery to replace the cornea with tissue from a donor. It is the most common solid tissue transplant in humans. -- Amina Nazarli is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @amina_nazarli Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 11:12 (UTC+04:00) By Trend Azerbaijans defense minister, Colonel General Zakir Hasanov will take part in a meeting of defense ministers of states contributing to the NATO Resolute Support Mission in Afghanistan, the press service of Azerbaijans Defense Ministry reported on November 7. At the meeting, to be held Nov. 9 in Brussels, Hasanov is expected to deliver speech on Azerbaijans contributions to international peacekeeping operations in Afghanistan, as well as bilateral cooperation with that country in the field of defense and security. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Bloc counters Congs authoritarianism logic Charging the alliance of the CPN-UML and the CPN (Maoist Centre) with leading the nation towards authoritarianism has become a major campaign tactic for the Nepali Congress and some regional parties in the eastern hills, who seem to be consolidating power to overcome the left alliance in the upcoming provincial and federal polls. 8 November 2017 17:48 (UTC+04:00) By Trend A solemn ceremony on the production of two billion tons of oil in Azerbaijan is underway at the Heydar Aliyev Center on November 8. President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev attended the ceremony. Delivering a speech at the event, President Aliyev said that the economic independence is the basis of the political independence. "Today we have ensured economic independence," the head of state said. "The economic independence is the basis of the political independence. If we are dependent on someone, we can never pursue an independent policy, and we can never express our principal position as we do today. The economic independence has led to political independence, and today Azerbaijan is one of the rarest countries in the world pursuing an independent policy. The economic independence is ensured by oil workers' efforts. Therefore, everyone should know that the oil and gas sector of our country will be the main support for many years. Therefore, the Azerbaijani state and the oilmen should put all their efforts to develop this sector." President Aliyev reminded that a solemn ceremony was held on the occasion of the production of one billionth ton of oil at the Opera and Ballet Theater under the chairmanship of Heydar Aliyev in 1971 "Today, in independent Azerbaijan, in this magnificent center, which is named after the National Leader, we celebrate the production of 2 billionth tons of oil. Independence is our greatest asset. Only during the years of independence, Azerbaijan achieved great peaks. Only during the years of independence the people became the owner of their natural resources. I believe that holding today's ceremony at the Center, bearing the name of the National Leader, is natural, because it is our main meeting hall, our main center - and it is also symbolic. Because Heydar Aliyev's services in 1970-1980s and 1990s provide Azerbaijan's realities. We, in turn, will do our utmost to further develop the oil and gas industry in Azerbaijan." President Aliyev stressed that Azerbaijan has enough oil. "They used to say that "there is no oil in Azerbaijan, there is no need to build the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline, which will never justify itself"," President Aliyev said. "Look, we have been producing oil since 1997 together with the consortium for 20 years. As I mentioned, the consortium extracted 460 million tons of oil only from the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli. But there are much more proven reserves. The extension of the contract until 2050 indicates that we have enough oil, let no one worry. "They wanted to connect the same topic with gas, yet the malefactors, the unfriendly forces, rumored that there is no gas in Azerbaijan. However, the Shah Deniz-2 project is a reality today. I have to note that our approved, proven oil reserves are about 1.5 billion tons, and the forecast is 2 billion tons. Our approved gas reserves are 2.6 trillion cubic meters, the forecast is approximately 3-4 trillion cubic meters. The development of the Azeri-Chirag field shows that we always display very conservative figures. I remember well that when the contract was signed in 1994, the reserves of the Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli fields were estimated at 511 million tons. Even at that time I, as a young worker at the State Oil Company, was surprised - how they can accurately calculate this - 511. Why not 510 or 512, but 511? Of course, this was a conventional figure. However, today's calculations show that the reserves of the fields are at least two times more than this minimum. 462 out of 511 conventional numbers have already been withdrawn. Until 2050, how much oil will it be? That's why I am sure that our predictions will be confirmed in reality. Because we are very conservative in evaluating available resources. The Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli field will operate up to 2050. I am sure that the Shah Deniz field will operate at least 100 years later. At present, we expect gas production from the Absheron field in the near future. Umid and Babek deposits have huge prospects. The State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) will work very actively in these fields next year. Some work is being done. Much more scaly work will be done," he said Then president of Azerbaijans State Oil Company SOCAR Rovnag Abdullayev, head of platform # 10 of the "28 May" Oil and Gas Production Department Gadim Aliyev, BP regional president for Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey Gary Jones, first-year student of the Baku Higher Oil School Mahira Asadova, vice-president of SOCAR Khoshbakht Yusifzade also delivered speeches. Yusifzade was awarded with the Labour Order of the first degree for his long and fruitful activity in the Azerbaijani oil industry, upon President Aliyevs decree. The president awarded Yusifzade with the Labour Order. In conclusion, a video footage about the history of the Azerbaijani oil industry was demonstrated. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 17:05 (UTC+04:00) By Rashid Shirinov The Latvian national airline AirBaltic has opened a representative office in Azerbaijan, newspaper Vergiler of Azerbaijani Taxes Ministry reported on November 8. Russian citizen Andrey Larchenko is the official representative of the company. AirBaltic is a joint stock company founded in 1995. Its main owner is the Latvian state, possessing 80.05 percent of the companys shares. Currently, AirBaltic offers direct year-round and seasonal flights from the three capitals of the Baltic countries Riga (Latvia), Vilnius (Lithuania) and Tallinn (Estonia). Its main hub is at Riga International Airport with further bases at Tallinn and Vilnius Airports. The air carrier has 30 airliners in its fleet, including six Boeing 737-300, five Boeing 737-500, seven Bombardier CS300 and eight Bombardier Q400 NextGen. AirBaltic was awarded by OAG air travel intelligence company for being the most punctual airline in the world in 2014 and 2015. Many tourists have visited Azerbaijan, especially its capital Baku, during past years and their number increases annually. This is natural, as Baku is among the most visited cities of the CIS countries. Over the past year, Azerbaijan received over 2 million tourists. In general, for the past 10 years, the number of tourists visiting the country increased by five times. People in Azerbaijan are well known for their hospitality, while the countrys nature with its climate, beauty and uniqueness mesmerizes even the most claimant tourists. The country with rich ancient history has thousands of places to visit, ranging from the capital to the unique villages lost in the clouds. --- Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 14:14 (UTC+04:00) By Trend The next round of talks on the comprehensive agreement between Azerbaijan and the European Union (EU) will be held on November 27-28 in Brussels, Head of Political, Economics and Press and Information Section of the EU Delegation to Azerbaijan Denis Daniilidis told Trend on November 8. He noted that the political chapter of the agreement will be discussed during the meeting. Earlier, it was planned to hold the meeting on November 6-7. In late 2016, the EU 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 new agreement should replace the Partnership and Cooperation Agreement and better take account of the shared objectives and challenges the EU and Azerbaijan face today. The new 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. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 18:43 (UTC+04:00) By Trend There will be innovations in the Baku Metro in the future, chief engineer for the operation of the Baku Metro CJSC Alikhan Osmanov told reporters on November 8. Osmanov said that it is planned to renovate existing stations with new equipment. Contracts will also be concluded with CJSC Metrowagonmash (Russia) to renovate the fleet and organize the movement of trains on new lines and purchase new-generation carriages. Fifteen carriages were purchased from the plant and commissioned in 2016, noted the chief engineer. The carriages are equipped with air conditioning system, said Osmanov adding that the new generation carriages will be much more convenient than the previous ones. Osmanov further said that twelve stations of the "purple" line of Baku Metro CJSC will be constructed till 2025. He said that the land plots for the construction of those stations have already been allocated. A "purple" line will stretch to Bakus Garachukhur settlement, he said. Two stations of this purple line, namely, "Avtovagzal" and "Memar Ajami-2" have already been put into operation. The construction of a number of other stations is underway. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 18:31 (UTC+04:00) By Trend Azerbaijan presented data on its daily oil production in October to the OPEC Joint Technical Committee as part of the Vienna Agreement, the Azerbaijani Energy Ministry told Trend on November 8. According to the ministry, daily oil production stood at 800,600 barrels in October, of which 746,800 barrels accounted for crude oil and 53,800 barrels for condensate. Meanwhile, 628,000 barrels of crude oil, 53,800 barrels of condensate and 24,300 barrels of oil products were exported per day. OPEC has repeatedly assessed Azerbaijan as a country that is actively fulfilling its commitments under the agreement to reduce oil production and as a leader in this direction, according to the ministry. Azerbaijan produced 793,900 barrels of oil per day in January, 776,400 barrels of oil per day in February, 733,300 barrels of oil per day in March, 781,100 barrels of oil per day in April, 785,300 barrels of oil per day in May, 793,700 barrels of oil per day in June, 796,700 barrels of oil per day in July, 734,800 barrels of oil per day in August, and 785,700 barrels of oil per day in September, said the ministry. The OPEC Joint Technical Committee was created to monitor the implementation of countries commitments to cut oil production. In December 2016 in Vienna, 11 non-OPEC countries, including Azerbaijan, agreed to curtail oil output jointly by 558,000 barrels per day. The agreement was signed for the first half of 2017, and on May 25 it was extended by late 1Q18. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 10:28 (UTC+04:00) By Trend Turkey and Iran have agreed to hold a joint military operation against the PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party) terrorist group in the north of Iraq, the Turkish media reported on November 8. An agreement on joint military operations of Ankara and Tehran has been reached recently, however the date of the beginning of the operation has not been revealed. Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said earlier that Turkey, Iran and Iraq are making joint efforts to ensure stability in the region. Stability and fight against terrorism are the priorities for both countries, noted the prime minister. The conflict between Turkey and the PKK, which demands the creation of an independent Kurdish state, has continued for more than 30 years and has claimed more than 40,000 lives. The UN and the European Union list the PKK as a terrorist organization. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 10:57 (UTC+04:00) By Trend Federica Mogherini, the High Representative of the European Union for foreign and security policy, will visit Uzbekistan on November 9. In Tashkent, Mogherini will meet with President Shavkat Mirzieev, the Uzbek Foreign Ministry reported Nov.8 "On November 9, a delegation of the European Union headed by High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini will arrive in Uzbekistan," the message said. The delegation includes EU Commissioner for International Cooperation and Development Neven Mimica and other officials. The visit program of the EU delegation also includes participation in the inter-regional ministerial meeting "European Union - Central Asia" and the international conference "Central Asia: one past and common future, cooperation for sustainable development and mutual prosperity" scheduled for November 10-11. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 12:48 (UTC+04:00) By Rufiz Hafizoglu/ Trend Arab countries lost their strong leaders as a result of the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in Iraq and the so-called Arab Spring. As there are no leaders in the Arab world, such countries as Turkey and Iran began to actively promote their interests in the region. Saudi Arabia thinks that during Barack Obamas presidency, Washington has changed its best ally to Iran. Irrespective of Obama's policy in the region, Saudi Arabia has never concealed its ambitions for leadership in the Middle East. Taking into account Irans current ambitions, today the tension between Saudi Arabia and Iran is growing every day. Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Adel bin Ahmed Al-Jubeir said that the chaos and instability occur in the region due to Iran. Saudi Arabian Minister of Gulf Affairs Thamer al-Sabhan also said that Riyadh will see Lebanon as a country that declared war on it. "Lebanon must know and understand the danger of Hezbollah," al-Sabhan said. Hezbollah's militants are involved in all the terrorist attacks that threatened Saudi Arabia, drug trafficking. Special attention should be also paid to the statement made by Lebanese Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri, who resigned during his recent visit to Saudi Arabia. As the main reason of his resignation, Hariri named interference by Iran and its accomplices, represented by Hezbollah, in Lebanons internal affairs which he could not resist. Hariri has already left Riyadh and paid a visit to the UAE capital of Abu Dhabi. Saudi Arabia and Iran have been unofficially fighting in Yemen for three years. It is clear that Lebanon will become the new bridgehead of confrontation between Iran and Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabias media outlets have already written that when taking part in the war in Syria, Hezbollah has lost its military power. However, Iran, actively fighting in Syria and Iraq and rendering military support to Hussites in Yemen, is simply unable to open another front in Lebanon in case of a popular uprising against Hezbollah. But according to other opinion, Hezbollah gained combat experience due to its participation in the war in Syria. Hezbollah is also a real threat to Israel. Amid the current events, one can say that a number of Arab countries see Iran as an enemy, rather than Israel. Perhaps, during the confrontation with Iran, Saudi Arabia will have to look for new allies among all the Sunni countries. At the same time, Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Sauds secret visit to Israel in September gives grounds to think that Saudi Arabia and Israel have already agreed on an alliance against Iran. According to Israeli media outlets, Mohammad bin Salman held talks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and high-ranking representatives of the Israeli Foreign Ministry. The sides discussed a joint regional peace initiative. It is also worth noting that the rapprochement between Israel and Saudi Arabia occurred as a result of a joint confrontation with the Iranian nuclear threat. Netanyahu has recently said that relations between Israel and some Arab countries have become close. The development of events in the region is still unknown. Sooner or later, Saudi Arabia will have to create an ideological doctrine that will not be based on a religious principle. It will be directed against Iran's "sectarian" policy. The military clashes in Syria, Iraq and Yemen, which were presented by Saudi Arabia as Shiite-Sunni, did not bring it the expected results. As a result, while using all opportunities, Saudi Arabia will try to revive Arab nationalism, aimed at uniting all Arabs, including Arab Shiites against Iran's policy. "Moderate Islam" project is planned to be the basis of the new Arab nationalism. If one recalls the recent history, one can see that Pan-Arabism and Arab nationalism are not new for the Arab countries. For example, the Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party was founded in Syria in 1947. It was hostile to political Islam, as well as to Israel. No matter how Saudi Arabia tried to revive Arab nationalism, there are a number of obstacles, one of which is Russia. Without taking into account Russia's interests in the region, Saudi Arabia will fail to promote the ideas of new Arab nationalism. Another obstacle to the revival of Pan-Arabism is the Muslim Brotherhood organization, which is considered an ideological enemy of Saudi Arabia and a friend of Iran, despite a number of disagreements with Iran. As for Turkey, which is making only moderate statements regarding Iran and Saudi Arabia, Ankara will not join the anti-Iran bloc. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 13:18 (UTC+04:00) By Trend Uzbekistan and Afghanistan discussed prospects for trade and economic cooperation, as the Uzbek Ministry of Foreign Trade hosted a meeting with the Special Representative of the Afghan President on cooperation with the CIS countries, Shokir Korgan, on November 7. The sides mulled the current state and prospects of trade and economic cooperation, the preparation of a number of intergovernmental agreements in the trade and economic sphere, as well as joint implementation of projects to develop the infrastructure of Afghanistan. Uzbek-Afghan relations cover practically all important spheres of cooperation - trade and economic, investment, political, etc. In Uzbekistan there are 70 enterprises with the Afghan capital, including 20 enterprises with 100% foreign capital. 12 companies and companies of Afghanistan in the field of services, trade operations, production of building materials operate in Uzbekistan. Six joint Uzbek-Afghan enterprises have been established on the territory of Afghanistan. In January, representatives of Uzbekistan and Afghanistan signed in Kabul a "road map" to increase trade turnover between countries to $ 1.5 billion. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 11:42 (UTC+04:00) By Kamila Aliyeva A nearly month-long row between the two NATO allies - Turkey and the U.S. - over the arrest of American Embassys worker resulted in certain difficulties in the operation of visa services in both states. The U.S. resumed issuance of visas to Turkish citizens on a limited basis, State Department spokesman Heather Nauert said at a press conference in Washington, Turkish media outlets reported. She noted that they had positive conversations with the Turkish government regarding the ongoing visa issue and that it was a step in the right direction. A limited number of visa appointments for Turkish citizens are being scheduled in the order of importance, according to Nauert. Were only able to do this on a limited basis right now, but we are prioritizing medical, humanitarian, and also student visas in those cases, she said. The two countries partially restored visa services on November 6. The U.S. and Turkey were set to discuss regional issues during a four-day visit of Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim to the U.S. which started on November 7. The agenda of the talks included the crisis in the U.S.-Turkish relations, as well as the issue of extradition of Fethullah Gulen, who is accused of being involved in the 2016 military coup attempt in Turkey. The U.S. and Turkey previously suspended the mutual issuance of non-immigrant visas. This decision followed the October 4 arrest of a Turkish national who works at the U.S. consulate in Istanbul for alleged involvement in the July 2016 coup attempt aimed to overthrow the Turkish president. This latest incident aggravated the already tense relationship between Washington and Ankara. The two countries have clashed over the U.S. support for Kurdish rebels in Syria as well as Turkish demands that the U.S. extradite Fethullah Gulen, a cleric whom Ankara blames for a military coup attempt of last July. In addition, Ankaras rapprochement with Russia and purchase of S-400 missiles become the subject of criticism by the U.S. --- Kamila Aliyeva is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Kami_Aliyeva Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz CIAA pastes notice at suspended IRD Chief Sharmas house The Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) has pasted a seven-day customary notice of summons outside the house of suspended Inland Revenue Department Chief Chudamani Sharma on Wednesday. 8 November 2017 14:04 (UTC+04:00) By Kamila Aliyeva Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev signed a decree on liquidation of the State Joint Stock Concern Uzfarmsanoat and creation of the Agency for the Pharmaceutical Industry Development under the Health Ministry. The document provides for the implementation of a set of measures aimed at improving the pricing mechanisms for these products, streamlining the activities of pharmaceutical companies. The agency is entrusted with the task of developing and implementing a strategy for the sustainable development of the pharmaceutical industry, including through the introduction of public-private partnerships, coordination of the activities of pharmaceutical enterprises and organizations, the provision of programs for providing the population and public health institutions with medicines, medical products and equipment. Along with this, the agency will carry out state registration and certification of medicines, medical products and equipment, including those imported from abroad, to certify pharmaceutical companies for compliance with international rules. The State Center for Expertise and Standardization of Medicines, Medical Devices and Medical Equipment of the Health Ministry, Uzbek Chemical and Pharmaceutical Research Institute, Tashkent Scientific Research Institute of Vaccines and Serums and the Research Institute for Oriental Medicine were transferred under the direction of agency. The Uzmedexport state enterprise has been renamed into Uzmedimpex SUE and put under the jurisdiction of the agency as well. It is a single supplier of socially important medicines and medical products on the list established by the Health Ministry, as well as an agent for their storage, processing and delivery. It is planned to create a single logistics center for the import of medicines, medical devices and equipment. Until December 1, 2018, a network of social pharmacies is planned to be opened on the basis of public health institutions (district (city) medical associations, rural family clinics, rural medical stations), as well as empty buildings and premises in state ownership. The Uzbek government previously approved healthcare reforms meant to increase the number of qualified medical personnel in state clinics, improve emergency services and restrain drug prices. Uzbekistan has a developed system of state medical facilities. Emergency care is free too. The number of patients treated at state facilities rose by 6 percent between 2010 and 2015, while the number of doctors working in those places rose only by 4 percent. --- Kamila Aliyeva is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Kami_Aliyeva Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 14:51 (UTC+04:00) By Kamila Aliyeva A one-day seminar organized by the World Bank (WB) and the Ministry of Housing and Communal Services was held in Tashkent on November 7, the World Bank said in a statement on November 8. WB experts and representatives of the ministries and departments of Uzbekistan took part in the event. The participants discussed the existing problems and barriers to the development of the water supply and sanitation (WSS) sector, and also considered a number of possible political and institutional solutions for ensuring stable access to WSS services in all regions of Uzbekistan. "Currently, we are successfully implementing $268 million worth projects, aimed to improve the water supply to the local population, especially to the rural areas, in the cities of Bukhara and Samarkand, as well as in the Syrdarya and Bukhara regions jointly with the World Bank. It is gratifying that today's seminar will discuss issues of further support by the World Bank of projects in the WSS sector, including technical assistance to the ongoing reforms in this area," Muzaffar Saliyev, the Uzbek Minister of Housing and Communal Services, said in his welcoming speech. The head of the WB representative office in Uzbekistan, Hideki Mori, noted that providing clean water to the countrys residents is one of the priorities of the government. "The World Bank Group is contributing to this important goal, and we will continue to support policy, institutional and human capacity development in this sector, in addition to financing the modernization of the water and sewer infrastructure. These investments are critical for the WSS sector and will contribute to the realization of social objectives, identified in the Strategy of Action for the five priority development directions of Uzbekistan in 2017-2021," he said. Uzbekistan has made substantial investment in upgrading its water supply and sanitation services in recent years. From 1995 to 2014, total public borrowing for improvements to these services amounted to US$ 344.1 million, the largest of any country in Central Asia. Despite these important efforts however, the countrys citizens continue to face challenges in accessing clean and reliable water services. For instance, less than half the national population (roughly 32 million people) remains unconnected to a piped water system, and only 17 percent of urban households receive water 24 hours per day. The situation is even worse in smaller cities and rural areas. The World Bank continues to support the WSS sector in the country by providing technical assistance to ensure the sustainable functioning of the WSS system and implementation of the Government's water supply reform program. Currently, the World Bank supports the implementation of 16 projects worth about $1 billion, covering such priority areas for country development as agriculture and water management, energy, transport, health, education, urban development, water supply and sanitation. --- Kamila Aliyeva is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Kami_Aliyeva Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 16:41 (UTC+04:00) By Kamila Aliyeva Uzbekistans population sold over $500 million to banks during September-October 2017. This was stated by the first deputy chairman of the Central Bank, Timur Ishmetov, at a conference in Tashkent. The volume of currency exchange increased by 70 percent compared to the same period last year, while exporters sales of foreign currency earnings - by half, according to the Central Bank. The banks representative also noted the growth of household deposits in foreign currency, which, in his opinion, characterizes the increase in public confidence in the monetary policy pursued by the Uzbek government. The Central Bank of Uzbekistan devalued the national currency soum by almost two times on September 5, setting the official exchange rate of US dollar at 8,100 soums/USD compared to 4,210.35 soums/USD on September 4. Simultaneously, restrictions were lifted for legal entities and individuals to convert the national currency. In the first week after restrictions were removed, the population handed over $200 million to banks, and legal entities - about $100 million. Currently, Uzbek people can buy foreign currency solely on plastic payment cards, which can be used abroad without any restrictions. Earlier, individual entrepreneurs and farmers in Uzbekistan were allowed to withdraw foreign currency from their bank accounts. In addition, legal entities can purchase foreign currency in banks without restrictions for payment on current international transactions - for the import of goods, works and services, repatriation of profits, repayment of loans, travel expenses and other non-trade transfers. At the time, physical persons can only sell currency to banks through exchange offices. --- Kamila Aliyeva is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Kami_Aliyeva Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 17:28 (UTC+04:00) By Kamila Aliyeva Azerbaijan plans to revise the amount of childcare allowance up to three years. Minister of Labor and Social Protection of Population Salim Muslimov made the remark while commenting on the proposals made at the parliament for increase of this allowance during the second day of the meeting on the draft state and consolidated budgets for 2018. In general, the ministry is reviewing the whole mechanism of targeted social assistance, according to the minister. "We are studying the experience of different countries and within the framework of this process we also plan to revise the allowances for children under three years old," Muslimov said. Currently, Azerbaijani citizens have the opportunity to receive benefits for a newborn. This amount is paid monthly until the child reaches the age of three. In certain cases, the sum of allowance is doubled. The amount of the allowance for each child up to 1.5 years is 30 manats, from 1.5 to 3 years - 15 manats. The minister further talked about pensions expenditures, noting that a special government commission will be created in Azerbaijan to calculate pension expenditures in the near future. He recalled that after the last amendments to the labor legislation, the concept of transfers to the State Social Protection Fund disappeared. Instead, the concept of state budget obligations was introduced. "There is a clear division of pensioners. The pension obligations that were formed before 1992 are now considered obligations of the state budget. During the six months, a special government commission will examine the documents of each of the 1.3 million pensioners to find out the experience of each of them," the minister said. He added that with the exception of allowances for civil servants and servicemen, the government will provide 228 million manat per month for pensions. The changes also affect the indexation of pensions, according to Muslimov. "If earlier the pension was divided into the basic and insurance part, currently such concepts do not exist, and the indexation in 2018 will affect the entire amount of the pension," he noted. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev on May 2, 2017 approved amendments to the law "On Labour Pensions". The amendments provide for the elimination of the concept of the basic part of the labour pension and the 12-year service required for the appointment of a pension, as well as the gradual increase in the retirement age for women and men up to 65 years. The retirement age will increase every six months until 2021 for men, until 2027 for women. In view of the elimination of the concept of "basic part of the pension", the law introduces the concept of "minimum pension". The size of the minimum pension from January 1, 2017 is 110 manats. Another change is connected with the compulsory social insurance. So, now 90 percent of the deductions paid by employee on compulsory state social insurance will be reflected in his/her account. Deductions are formed from two sources: the deductions made by the employer in the amount of 22 percent of the salary fund of the enterprise, and the deductions worth 3 percent of the employee's wage. Formerly, only 50 percent of these deductions were reflected in employees account. The law comes into force from July 1, 2017 and does not affect persons who retired before that date. --- Kamila Aliyeva is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Kami_Aliyeva Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 17:51 (UTC+04:00) By Kamila Aliyeva Russia will not rush with the expansion of Turkish tomato supplies at the expense of new enterprises. This was stated by the head of the Russian Agriculture Ministry, Alexander Tkachev, in an interview with Russia 24 TV channel, RIA Novosti reported. "We will look at the quality of Turkish products, and how these volumes will affect the price, as well as the production of tomatoes inside Russia. Based on this, we will make certain decisions," he said. Russia has officially allowed the import of Turkish tomatoes on quotas set by the Agriculture Ministry in late October. From November 1, Russia lifted a strict ban on the import of tomatoes from Turkey. Nevertheless, certain restrictions still remain in place. Ankara will be able to deliver 50,000 tons of tomatoes to the Russian market by the end of the year. Previously, the Russian Agriculture Ministry has submitted to the Government its proposals on the mechanism for the resumption of tomato imports from Turkey. Russia levied an embargo on the imports of certain products from Turkey because of the jet-downing crisis in late 2015. Many have been resolved, except the tomato ban, which is the most serious for the Turkish suppliers. Rosselkhoznadzor, which has recently inspected several Turkish tomato producers, announced earlier that it can consider only large manufacturers for issuing permits for the tomato import. In mid September, Kommersant cited the manager of a large vegetable producer in Russia and several representatives of the industrys lobby group saying supplies could start from several Turkish firms approved by Russias watchdog Rosselkhoznadzor. Currently, there are two types of restrictions with respect to Turkish tomatoes. One of them was introduced by the government of the country. The second is a technical ban, introduced by the Rosselkhoznadzor in connection with the detection of contaminated quarantineable products coming to Russia from Turkey. The ban on the tomato import is considered to be the most negative for Turkey since Russia was the largest market for the Turkish tomato export with annual profit amounting to billions of dollars. After the tomato ban, the amount of Turkish tomato exports to Russia decreased by 10.3 percent while their value dropped by 34.3 percent in 2016. Turkey exported 541,000 tons of tomatoes to Russia in 2015, however, the amount fell to 486,000 tons. The value of tomato exports to the country was $365.3 million in 2015 and later decreased to $239.9 million, Daily Sabah reported. However, during the first seven months of the current year, the amount of tomatoes exported to Russia increased by 9.4 percent and the value of tomato exports also surged by 24.7 percent. During the period of January-July, Turkey's tomato exports to Russia reached $198.3 million from last year's $159 million. Moreover, last year, the amount of tomato exports were recorded at 322,000 tons while it reached to 353,000 tons this year during the first seven months. --- Kamila Aliyeva is AzerNews staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @Kami_Aliyeva Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz 8 November 2017 19:43 (UTC+04:00) By Trend Foreign Minister of Iran Mohammad Javad Zarif paid an official visit to Tajikistan. The main purpose of the visit is the opening of a new building of Irans embassy in Tajikistan, Tajik media reported. Iranian foreign minister is also expected to meet with President of Tajikistan Emomali Rahmon. Zarif will also meet with the speakers of the lower and upper chambers of the Tajik parliament. These meetings will be devoted to the current state of Tajik-Iranian relations. This is the first visit of a high-ranking Iranian official to Tajikistan over the past two years. The relations between the two countries deteriorated in 2013 for a number of reasons. Later, Tajik government limited the import of Iranian goods. A number of Iranian companies and funds in Tajikistan were closed. However, the current visit of the Iranian minister to Tajikistan is a promising factor for the improvement of bilateral relations. --- Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz Saginaw-based St. Mary's of Michigan Foundation will bestow its St. Vincent Award to Saginaw-based Valley Anesthesia at its 23rd Cornette Ball, Nov. 18 in Saginaw. Here's what you should know: 1. This is the first time the foundation will recognize a physicians group. 2. The five physicians of Valley Anesthesia have served the Great Lakes Bay area for more than 30 years. The five physicians have served St. Mary's for a combined 116-plus years. 3. The foundation presents its St. Vincent Award to a respected physician or group who "rendered long and noteworthy service to the Great Lakes Bay area." 4. Among the St. Vincent Award honorees is Bapineedu Maganti, MD, of the Saginaw-based Towne Centre Surgery Center. He has led Valley Anesthesia since 1985. Here are six updates on GI companies from the past week: A study, published in the Indian Journal of Gastroenterology, examined the safety and efficacy of Mederi Therapeutics' Stretta Therapy in treating gastroesophageal reflux disease. Vizient bestowed its 2017 Innovative Technology designation on Teleflex's LMA Gastro Airway medical device. Motus GI presented results of a study evaluating the performance of its Pure-Vu System at the 25th UEG Week, Oct. 28 to Nov. 1 in Barcelona, Spain. The Colon Cancer Alliance changed its name to the Colorectal Cancer Alliance. IM HealthScience announced results of its "Functional Dyspepsia Adherence and Compliance Trial" for its FDgard product. Studies, presented at the 25th UEG Week, demonstrated the effectiveness of Takeda's Entyvio in treating ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease, IBD News Today reported. CEO of Tulsa (Okla.) Spine & Specialty Hospital Terry Woodbeck plans to retire at the end of the year, and the hospital's current COO Trent Gastineau is slotted to take his place in 2018, according to GTR Newspapers. Here are three key notes: 1. Mr. Woodbeck was the founding CEO of Tulsa Spine & Specialty Hospital, a joint venture between Tulsa-based Hillcrest HealthCare System and a group of physician owners. He has been instrumental in its development since 2002 and oversaw Hillcrest's purchase of majority ownership in 2014. 2. Under his leadership, TSSH earned the Healthgrades Outstanding Patient Experience and Patient Safety Excellence Awards. The hospital includes ENT, general surgery, gynecology and ophthalmology in addition to orthopedics and spine. 3. After Mr. Woodbeck retires in December, Mr. Gastineau will take the reigns. He has been COO since 2010 and has previous experience at Houston Hospital for Specialized Surgery, in addition to other Texas-and Oklahoma-based hospitals. Billionaire physician and medical entrepreneur Patrick Soon-Shiong, MD, is facing criticism for reportedly boosting sales of his GPS Cancer genetic tests by citing positive experiences from three physicians with financial ties to one of his biotech companies, according to Politico. Sales of the genetic tests, which Dr. Soon-Shiong says guide cancer treatment by matching patients with tailored drug therapies, have failed to meet analysts' expectations. Based on a review of financial documents and corporate filings, a Politico investigation found that of the 1,286 tests sold in 2016, more than 100 were sold to institutions linked to three physicians on the payroll in Dr. Soon-Shiong's network. Dr. Soon-Shiong had touted these physicians' successes with his tests without disclosing they were consultants of his companies. For example, on a November 2016 earnings call, he spoke about a "physician in Sarasota Florida who has now shared with me personally how this has affected how he treats patients," Politico reports. He added the physician, Steve Mamus, MD, achieved an excellent result with one lung cancer patient who used the test, and that GPS Cancer "is not just a flurry of useless information." Dr. Mamus, however, began work as a paid consultant for Dr. Soon-Shiong two months earlier. Jen Hodson, a spokeswoman for Dr. Soon-Shiong, told Politico the use of physicians as consultants by Dr. Soon-Shiong's companies doesn't create an ethical issue. "In the cases where physicians have relationships with [Dr. Soon-Shiong's biotech firm] NantKwest there is a proactive conflict of interest policy which is available on our website for all to transparently see," she said. More articles on data analytics & precision medicine: Lawmakers: Every agency needs a chief data officer 13 highlights from EHR vendors', tech companies' Q3 financial results 10 most interesting health IT partnerships this week Darchula, East Rukum voters at a loss While political parties are busy in door-to-door campaigns in Darchula and East Rukum ahead of the federal and provincial elections, many voters in the districts are oblivious about the voting process. Darchula, which is in Province 7, and East Rukum of Province 6 go to the polls on November 26. Community Medical Center Long Beach (Calif.), which opened in 1924 and is part of Fountain Valley, Calif.-based MemorialCare Health System, will close in the near future due to the inability to retrofit the hospital to meet California's seismic standards. When MemorialCare acquired Community Medical Center Long Beach in 2011, officials knew it had seismic challenges. However, the hospital consulted with seismic experts, structural engineers and architects as part of recent seismic studies, which revealed the fault running below the hospital is larger and more active than previously known, hospital officials said Monday, according to The Grunion. This means the hospital will not meet California's new earthquake safety requirements for acute care hospitals, which go into effect June 30, 2019. John Bishop, CEO of the three MemorialCare hospitals in Long Beach, said because the wide fault zone is under the majority of the hospital campus, no work can be done to make the hospital viable, according to the Long Beach Post. "We are all saddened that the findings were not more encouraging for the future of Community Medical Center Long Beach," said Mr. Bishop. He said MemorialCare has no choice but to close the hospital. However, he said hospital and city officials will work together on transition plans to meet the needs of the community. "Nothing involved in this was an elective decision. We had no choice," Mr. Bishop said. "I'm saddened by this, but I want to assure Long Beach residents MemorialCare continues to be dedicated to providing the healthcare the city needs." Mr. Bishop said hospital officials will discuss the matter with city officials to determine how long the hospital and its emergency department will remain open. A recent study found there are seven acute care hospitals within a short distance of Community Medical Center Long Beach that could absorb the hospital's patients, and the need for acute care inpatient beds will decrease as more patients are shifted to outpatient care settings, according to the Long Beach Post. More articles on healthcare finance: 15-bed Missouri hospital's 2,353% revenue increase raises red flags with regulators 1,597 hospitals will see payment bump under value-based purchasing: 5 things to know CMS releases physician fee schedule for 2018: 6 things to know Maine voters have approved Medicaid expansion under the ACA, according to The Hill. The move makes Maine the first state to approve Medicaid expansion via referendum. Maine Equal Justice Partners, a liberal advocacy group, put the issue on the November ballot after Republican Gov. Paul LePage vetoed multiple legislative attempts to expand coverage to more low-income residents. With the vote, the state estimates about 80,000 Mainers will be able to gain Medicaid coverage, according to the report. Maine joins the 31 other states, plus Washington, D.C., that have approved Medicaid expansion. The Women & Children's Hospital of Buffalo (N.Y.) will change its name again once the newly constructed $270 million hospital facility officially opens Nov. 10, according to The Buffalo News. The facility will be rebranded the John R. Oishei Children's Hospital. A spokesperson for the hospital said despite numerous changes to the facility's name throughout its 125-year history, patients and residents continue to refer to it as the "children's hospital." "Before becoming Women & Children's of Buffalo, it was Children's Hospital of Buffalo," the spokesperson told The Buffalo News. "Even after that change, people still refer to it as Children's Hospital of Buffalo. They still do, even to this day. So, it just made sense for it to be Oishei Children's Hospital." Patients will see no change in the hospital's services following the rebranding. Innovative, government-led education initiatives in other countries have been successful at helping maintain a skilled healthcare workforce to meet universal health coverage requirements, according to a study published in Health Affairs. But the study argues while these initiatives offer insights that can potentially be used in the U.S., more research is needed to determine long-term impact. For the study, researchers examined various initiatives in Thailand, Brazil and India. In Thailand, the studied initiatives involved training and retaining physicians in rural areas of the country. Researchers said the country's Collaborative Project to Increase Production of Rural Doctors and the One District One Doctor program have been successful in terms of improving rural retention rates as well as the clinical and community-oriented competencies of medical school graduates. In Brazil, researchers looked at the country's Family Health Strategy nationwide federal program, which is designed to improve primary care access through training of community health workers. They said the Family Health Strategy has been successful, extending primary care access to a large majority of the country's residents and decreasing infant and child mortality. In India, researchers looked at the country's Nurse Practitioner in Primary Health Care program, which launched last year and involves a postgraduate diploma program in primary care for nurses. They said it is too early to fully assess the program's impact but noted "the strategy of shifting primary care responsibilities to nurses may be particularly cost-effective in the Indian context." Even though these initiatives have had some successes, the study notes the long-term impact is not yet known. "Further research is needed to assess the impact of such initiatives on the long-term retention of workers particularly doctors and the adequacy of the training offered to lower-skilled workers to effectively plug medical personnel gaps. Systematic monitoring of program affordability and cost-effectiveness over time must be prioritized, alongside efforts to disseminate lessons learned," the study's authors wrote. More articles on human capital: Only 44% of hospice workers document their own end-of-life wishes, study finds 200 healthcare workers, supporters to protest alleged understaffing at City of Hope 4 findings on first responders and mental health Workers at Portland, Ore.-based Legacy Health ratified a contract agreement with management Monday night. The labor deal, which averts a planned 48-hour strike, covers workers represented by Service Employees International Union Local 49 at Legacy Emanuel Medical Center, Randall Children's Hospital at Legacy Emanuel, and the Unity Center for Behavioral Health, all in Portland. The union members include certified nursing assistants, emergency department technicians, central sterile employees, food and nutrition workers and others. In an email to Becker's, the union said the three-year contract agreement was ratified in a vote of 238-31. According to SEIU Local 49, the labor deal includes "improved access to financial assistance to cover healthcare costs, including the addition of a full-time financial counselor that will assist SEIU members in navigating heir healthcare benefits, finding in-network care, and applying for financial assistance." The union said it also garnered a 7.75 percent pay increase over the contract's duration, along with a $1.10 per hour longevity differential for experienced workers, and measures aimed at improved workplace safety at the Unity Center. Legacy Health expressed pleasure that a labor deal was reached. "There were areas of natural agreement, such as offering personalized financial assistance for employees with questions or concerns about their expenses. We also maintain several of the features of our employee health plan that exist today that are well-aligned with the ACA," said Brian Terrett, director of public and community relations at Legacy Health. Both sides have been in negotiations for months. Last month, SEIU Local 49 announced plans to strike Nov. 8 and 9. More articles on human capital: Only 44% of hospice workers document their own end-of-life wishes, study finds 200 healthcare workers, supporters to protest alleged understaffing at City of Hope 4 findings on first responders and mental health A former executive at Providence Hospital in Washington, D.C., was sentenced Monday to 18 months in federal prison for stealing $391,600 from an association of medical professionals, according to the Department of Justice. Deborah A. Morrison worked at Providence Hospital from 1978 until 2016, and most of that time was spent in executive positions. She most recently served as senior vice president of risk management and planning and project integration. Beginning in 2001, Ms. Morrison was responsible for reviewing bank account statements for Providence Hospital Medical Staff, an association of medical professionals at the hospital. In this role, she had access to the association's checkbooks. From December 2009 until December 2015, Ms. Morrison wrote approximately 140 checks totaling $391,600 from one of the association's bank accounts and deposited the checks into her personal bank account. She used a signature stamp of a former association president to endorse the checks. Ms. Morrison pleaded guilty in July 2017 to transportation of money taken by fraud. In addition to her prison term, Ms. Morison was ordered to pay $391,600 in restitution. More articles on legal and regulatory issues: Chicago hospital sues Leapfrog for defamation 15 latest healthcare industry lawsuits, settlements CHS' Lutheran Health Network sues ex-CEO for breach of contract, defamation Mount Sinai Co-Director of the Neurosurgical Spine Program Arthur Jenkins, MD, is planning to transition into full time private practice at the beginning of 2018. Here are five key notes: 1. On Jan. 1, 2018, Dr. Jenkins will leave his post at Mount Sinai for private practice but maintain academic affiliation as faculty as well as surgical and admitting privileges at Mount Sinai. 2. His new practice will be known as Jenkins NeuroSpine. In a LinkedIn post, Dr. Jenkins wrote, "rest assured that I will be keeping my practice going at Mount Sinai and CT, but just changing the location where I see patients while I update and improve the way I see patients." 3. Dr. Jenkins plans to "reinvent [his] role as a surgeon, innovator and researcher" with this move after spending 16 years as a full-time academic physician. "Every day I want to raise the bar more for how we improve the lives of all patients with back and neck problems," he wrote. "This new practice environment will allow me to react and change more easily, getting away from the dogma and old inefficient ways, but keeping the structures that time has shown truly improve treatment and quality of live." 4. The new practice will have a foundation in evidence-based medicine and technology designed to improve quality of care. 5. Dr. Jenkins earned his medical degree at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine in Philadelphia and completed his neurosurgical residency at Mount Sinai. His additional training includes a spine surgery fellowship at Boston-based Brigham and Women's Hospital. Belfast has slipped significantly down a list of the UK's top cities to live and work - dropping from fifth to 30th place in just two years. The latest PwC Good Growth for Cities index ranks cities on a combination of economic performance and quality of life. And while Belfast was named fifth among the so-called 'devolved' cities, which include Scottish and Welsh locations, it has now fallen down the table of cities across the UK overall. And while Belfast has enjoyed strong job creation, cities in England performed better and enjoyed faster recovery in what PwC said were "key economic and social areas including new business formation, employment growth and improved incomes". "The fall in Belfast's performance in both the devolved nations and the overall UK rankings reflected Belfast's slower than average employment recovery, the UK's highest economic inactivity and the lack of real growth in regional wages," it said. Meanwhile, Derry is the lowest ranked devolved city, scoring below average in the majority of the variables, according to the report. However, "the city's score for job creation was slightly ahead of generally higher performing devolved cities like Cardiff, Sterling, Perth and even Belfast", it said. "Overall, the results for Londonderry are more positive than in 2013-2015, largely due to improvements in jobs and income. "However, its position on the border with the Republic of Ireland means a significant number of the city's 'working population' commute into the region from the Republic." According to the report, England and Scotland have outperformed Wales and Northern Ireland throughout almost the entire period since 2005-07. Paul Terrington, PwC's Northern Ireland regional chairman, said the challenge for Northern Ireland is to "learn the lessons" of faster-growing cities. "We've seen broad-based improvements in our Good Growth index across the UK, driven in particularly by falling unemployment rates. "However, the Good Growth index also sends a clear message to government and city leaders that there's more to prosperity and growth than GDP." Mr Terrington added: "Some areas in the North and Midlands where recovery from the financial crisis had seemingly lagged are now showing clear improvements in their index scores and the relatively recent combined authorities and 'city-deal' areas are catching up fast. "In Northern Ireland, the challenge is to learn the lessons of these fast-improving English regions and get the balance right between investment and reform and maintain a clear focus on driving improved productivity and economic growth while delivering public services efficiently. "It's also clear that Brexit will have a profound impact on Northern Ireland and the challenges facing Londonderry and the north west are particularly acute. The lack of an Executive for the better part of this year has not helped that situation." Oxford, Reading and Southampton came out as the top three performing cities in the UK. The former boss of a Co Fermanagh meat company which went bust owing over 2.5m has received a lengthy boardroom ban for misconduct The former boss of Northern Ireland company which went bust owing over 2.5m has received a lengthy boardroom ban for misconduct. Micheal Gerard Flynn (35), from Co Monaghan, and his mother, also a director, were investigated by the Insolvency Service after meat firm Flynn Fine Foods, based in Co Fermanagh, went out of business in 2013. Mr Flynn, from Mullitagorry in Smithboro, has been disqualified as a director for 11 years. And Ann Teresa Flynn (63), of Magherarney in Smithboro, was banned from the boardroom for four years. In proceedings brought by the Department for the Economy, Mr Flynn acknowledged misdemeanours as a director including failing to account for all assets of the company and also misappropriating and/or seeking to put assets beyond the reach of the administrators of the company. Around 40 jobs were lost when Flynn Fine Foods in Roslea shut down in 2013. It had been founded by Micheal Flynn Snr in the 1970s and went on to supply meats to some of Ireland's top supermarkets. Its products included cooked meats, sausages, bacon and pork chops. The company was registered at Companies House as Empire Meats Ltd, though it traded as Flynn Fine Foods from Dernawilt Road and Derryvollen in Roslea. It went into administration in September 2013. Mrs Flynn accepted instances of unfit conduct, including failing to inform herself about what was going on with the company and therefore failing to prevent Micheal Flynn from misappropriating or seeking to put assets beyond the reach of the administrators. She had also failed to bring oversight and control to how the company was run and failed to ensure the firm filed accounts on time and annual returns on time. Mr Flynn accepted other instances of unfit conduct including causing or permitting false invoices to be generated, and causing or permitting the unauthorised advance of monies from a financial provider. He also presented cheques, direct debits and standing orders when there was not enough money to cover them, and submitted an inaccurate and misleading statement of affairs about the company. And Mr Flynn accepted that he had not filed accounts and annual returns on time. Dhading bus accident: Memo submitted to PM demanding compensation to victims' kin Leaders of Saptari district on Tuesday submitted a memorandum to Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba, saying the government failed to carry out effective treatment of the injured of Trishuli bus accident and compensation to the victims. First Derivatives Kx technology is to be used by Red Bulls Formula 1 team Newry financial software giant First Derivatives said it could add a further 500 new staff to its workforce next year after posting a surge in sales to almost 90m for the first half of 2017. The company produces software used in the financial service sector, but has also landed deals for work with Formula One team Red Bull and in other areas. Overall, its turnover rose by 22% to 87.8m for the first six months of 2017. And while pre-tax profits fell slightly, dropping from 7m to 6.3m - due to currency changes and acquisition costs - its adjusted profits rose by 13% to 11.4m. The company has hired 450 staff this year already, and Adrian Toner, chief operating officer, told the Belfast Telegraph that it could add the same, or more, next year. The firm, headed by Brian Conlon, now employs around 2,100 workers across 14 locations, with around 500 spread across Newry and Belfast. "We have hired 450 people this year, and have 21 new starters in Newry this week," Mr Toner said. "Roughly, everyone is recruited out of Newry, and then deployed. Around 160 of those have come from Queen's and Ulster University. "One of the highlights for us is very strong growth in the software revenue. We are very pleased with that. "Clearly it has been our strategy to move into other verticals. We are industry agnostic - and now expanding into retail, pharma, and recently Formula One. "Kx technology with Red Bull Racing will be used to analyse sensor data with F1 vehicles, and wind tunnel data. It will also be used in real time for the drivers, and the team. "We are having a really exciting conversation with various sectors, including healthcare, retail and telecoms." Mr Toner said the challenge will be in the firm's ability to recruit the right people in sufficient numbers. "We can see the same recruitment numbers happening next year, if not more," he added. First Derivatives has offices in London, Dublin, New York, Stockholm, Philadelphia, Palo Alto and other global locations, while maintaining its Newry and Belfast bases. Speaking about Brexit, Mr Toner said that while it does cause problems and issues, the firm's wide footprint will help it tackle any concerns it could face. "On one hand, does it cause problems, the mobility of labour? Yes it does, but it affords opportunities as well. We have a large operation in the Republic and throughout Europe. Any decision to move capital markets, we think we are well covered and will afford others," he said. "With the Trump administration, it's much more difficult to employ internationally. It's a fact of life. It's not an immovable object. We have to get it over it." Looking ahead to future projects, he said: "First Derivatives is all about innovation... we are looking at blockchain, we are looking at analytics, industrial 'internet of things', robotics and artificial intelligence." The boss of Titanic Belfast is moving on from the top post to take on the running of a top 17th century Irish estate and tourist attraction. Tim Husbands has been named chief executive of Westport House, in Co Mayo. He has headed up Titanic Belfast since 2011, and was previously in charge of the Waterfront and Ulster Hall in Belfast. Owen Hughes, director of the Hughes Group, which runs Westport House, said: This marks the beginning of an exciting new phase for Westport House and Hotel Westport. Tim Husbands brings vast tourism, capital project and industry experience and ability, and is the ideal person to build a leading, recognisable international brand and destination here in Westport. We look forward to working with him. Tim Husbands, said: "Titanic Belfast has proved to be a shining example of how a significant tourism investment combined with passion and belief can be a catalyst for economic growth and help positively position a destination on the worldwide stage. Im very proud of all that Titanic Belfast has achieved in its first five years. "Most notably, being named the Worlds Leading Tourist Attraction at the World Travel Awards, which truly is testament to the amazing team that Ive had the privilege to work with. "Over the past 25 years, it has been an honour to play a role in the transformation of Belfast into a destination of choice for both leisure and business tourists. It is a fantastic city and Im sure it and Northern Ireland will go from strength-to-strength. "Moving to take up the challenge at Westport House and Hotel Westport will provide me with an opportunity to work with another new key tourism project that has the potential to impact positively on the continued development of Westport and Mayo as a tourist destination. Titanic Belfast welcomed almost 440,000 through its doors between April and August. That's up from 360,000 in 2016. "Growth has increased year-on-year in all key markets and to date 2017 has seen a 31% increase in visitors from England and 16% from the Republic of Ireland," it said. The Palestinian Table by Reem Kassis, photography by Dan Perez, is published by Phaidon priced 24.95. Available now While we're all rather au fait with Middle Eastern cuisine these days, thanks to the likes of Yotam Ottolenghi, Sabrina Ghayour, and Itamar Srulovich and Sarit Packer of Honey & Co, how much do you really know about Palestinian food? Well, Reem Kassis' new cookbook The Palestinian Table is set to fill that gap, with recipes inspired by three generations of her family's cooking traditions. Here's what we think of it... Who will love it? Anyone interested in traditional, home-cooked family meals and is intrigued by Palestinian culture. Also, those who adore a good flat bread smothered with tasty toppings. What sort of food is it trying to get us cooking? Palestinian food, and all the nuanced flavours that entails. Reem wants us to see it as a distinct cuisine, rather than just as Middle Eastern food (so much goes by that name these days, often purely because it involves a sprinkling of pomegranate seeds). How easy is it? Recipes range from the ridiculously easy (straining yoghurt for labneh, frying eggs with sumac spice), to making decadent puddings (fenugreek semolina cake, shredded filo and cheese pie), and low and slow roasts and stews (rice-stuffed chicken and lamb, garlic and chickpea pilaf). Some of the spices may require a little hunting out. The best recipe is... The cauliflower fritters. Packed with spring onions, parsley and cumin, as well as Reem's favourite 'nine spice' mix, these are crisp, colourful and apparently are great for brunch dunked in labneh. The recipe that we're most likely to post pictures of on Instagram is... Baklawa; curls of golden filo pastry dusted with bright green pistachios and drizzled with syrup. Like, like, like. Overall rating: 4/5 Women make up almost 10% of the UK's armed forces - although not every role within the military is open to women. The image of a female soldier with gun in hand is still one that makes for uncomfortable viewing for some across the world. Last month the Queen helped to mark 100 years of women in the Army and Navy. And, for those who are keen to serve their country there are still plenty of opportunities, both as Army regulars or in the Reserves. I take the risks very seriously and am aware of my security Abigail Hassall (35) is a Major in the Army Reserves. She is married and lives in Belfast. She says: I've just qualified as a consultant general surgeon. I took a bit of an odd route to the Reserves. I was in the Sea Cadets in school and really enjoyed that, but I left to go to university. It was when I became a surgical registrar that I realised I could have access to training and skills in the Army that I wouldn't have in the health service, mostly surrounding trauma. I joined the Navy Reserves in 2010 and then moved to the Army Reserves in 2013. As a reservist you give 27 days a year to the Army, but the health service does release you to go and train - you don't have much spare time as a doctor. I loved the evening training, too - it's a bit of stress relief from your day job. They call it military tourism because you do travel to places like Cyprus, but you're not sitting on the beach with a cocktail. It was difficult to fit in around a training rota, but it was worth it. There is a risk of joining the Army in Northern Ireland, but I felt as a doctor it would be unlikely that I was targeted - that would be bad form. But it's a risk I take seriously - I'm very aware of security. I haven't deployed yet. I was too junior during Afghanistan and I volunteered for Sierra Leone, but they didn't need me. I would like to deploy at some stage though. I can leave whenever I like but I think I'm a lifer - as long as I'm enjoying it and getting something out of it. There is a camaraderie you get with your unit in the Army that you won't find anywhere else. I spend a week a year in officer training with the Royal Marines. We'll be freezing cold in a field, knackered and starving, but we all come away saying we had the best time. I've never had a problem being a woman in the Army. The only distinction between a man and a woman is during the fitness test when you have to run a mile and a half. Men get slightly less time than women, but that changes as you get older, too. We do a combat fitness test - you carry all your kit and a rifle and everyone carries the same weight over a six-mile run in a set time and that time is the same for everyone. Women aren't in the infantry so it's unlikely I'll end up on my elbows with a gun in the undergrowth. I don't mind that at all because I'm a surgeon - I understand the reasons the same as I understand there aren't women on submarines. Mind you, if people want to do it that's great. My husband is in the Naval Reserves so he understands what I do - he supports me and I support him. The annoying thing is that we train on different nights so we have limited time together. He'll probably advance through the ranks faster than me as he'll be in a command position. It might get to the stage where I will step back to preserve our family life - I know if the roles were reversed he would do the same for me. You get a lot out of joining the Reserves. It doesn't matter what job you do during the day, the military will give you confidence and great people skills. There are skills I do in my day job that I learned in the military." 'My career's been an absolute whirlwind but very enjoyable' Kerry McFadden-Newman (41) is a Major in the Queen Alexandra's Royal Army Nursing Corps. She lives on the north coast with her husband Guy and their three children, Caoimhe (11), Fionn (8) and Teagan (16 months). In 2015 she was awarded the Associate Royal Red Cross Medal for outstanding military nursing, the first recipient of whom was Florence Nightingale. She says: I was always interested in nursing and have family in the Army. When I was at school representatives of the three Armed Forces came to visit and really started to pique my interest. But the Army stood out for me the most. My original plan was to join the Army as a student nurse. They only ask for a four-year commitment once you've qualified with the added bonus that you get paid the whole way through. I was in the process of applying when there was a big cost-cutting exercise and they told me to go off and get qualified and then join afterwards. I was 23 when I joined - I had done my nurse qualifications in Bath, but I still needed to train as a soldier. Most of my class were 17 or 18 years old so mine was the shoulder they would end up crying on. Basic training teaches you weaponry, tactics and how to work really well as a unit. Five years after I passed out I applied for officer training at Sandhurst. That's much more about training you as a leader and pushing you as an individual. My career has been an absolute whirlwind but very, very enjoyable. I've been on exercise to Germany, Jordan, Kenya and of course around the UK. I've been deployed to Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan. I prepped for Sierra Leone but I wasn't needed. You travel a lot in the Army anyway for courses, training and exercise. Over the course of my career I could find myself working in the operating theatre, acute medicine or training. I've had vast experience in all sorts of different fields. We came home to Northern Ireland a couple of years ago and I've been working in a field hospital here as a training officer. I work with the Army Reserves and with them alone I've been to Canada, the USA and Gibraltar - they're a busy lot, too. We came back because I'll be leaving the Army next year. I think a part of me knew I would come back home and settle down. It's just been about finding the right time to do it. My children have had some amazing experiences but I think it's time we settle down for them. I made the decision to join the Army and I knew what I was getting into. It's given me a lot of confidence and I met my husband in it - he has now left the service. We've had kids who have had a blast moving round a lot. I think we've been very lucky as my kids have had all sorts of experiences. I know I was away a lot but thanks to Skype and WhatsApp it's become so much easier to stay in touch. The Army has been very good to me and I'm so grateful for everything I've experienced but it's time to lay my hat down. I'll certainly be in the Reserves because I feel I have more to give. I've worked with them for the last couple of years and I know how they tick - I have huge respect for all of the time and energy they give." 'I was head of theatre at a camp in Helmand Province' Joy Duffield (56) is a Lieutenant Colonel in the Army Reserves. She lives in Belfast with her husband Barry and has two daughters, Rihann (22) and Jamie (20). She says: I have retired as a theatre sister and nurse educator with the health service, but I'm now doing project work. I joined the Army Reserves in 1985. A friend asked if I would like to do something different and it all moved very quickly on from there. That was the height of the Troubles, but it didn't cross our minds as being risky at the time. We were young and you don't think of those things. I wasn't that long qualified as a nurse and I was just exploring things to do. I joined as a commissioned officer - a second lieutenant - and went on to work my way up the ranks. Like everything else, the more you put into it, the more you get out of it. I've loved having the chance at doing something different and away from the hospital. I wasn't very physical before I joined up but I did become after. I've taken part in a few marches including the Nijmegen march in the Netherlands that is 160km over four days. I was deployed to Afghanistan in 2008 - I was the head of theatre for 13 weeks at a camp in Helmand Province. It was hard but the most difficult thing for me was the heat. It was July and the temperature could reach the mid-50s. I was surprised at how fast I got used to it. When I joined I wasn't married and you get very involved in Army life very quickly. When the first Iraq war happened I could have been deployed but my dad was very ill at the time. This made it all very real and was a big decision - and I realised it was what I wanted in the future. Going away for a long time is hard but my family knows what's expected of me so it's not that big a shock when it happens. We weren't in much danger - we were working in the hospital that was well into the camp. I've been able to make the Reserves fit for me and was able to take a step back for a year when my girls were very young. I would encourage anyone to join the Reserves - it gives you so many opportunities and, for young people, really builds your confidence. There is the possibility of deployment, but I think most people embrace that now - everyone knows what they are getting into." The man was stabbed in the Ballnafoy Close area. A 23-year-old man has been charged with attempted murder and possession of an offensive weapon after a fight broke out in south Belfast on Tuesday. He is expected to appear before Belfast Magistrates Court Thursday morning. Police were called to an altercation in the Ballynafoy Close area of the Ravenhill Road and found that a man is his early 20s had been stabbed multiple times. He was taken to hospital although his injuries were not described as life threatening. A 44-year-old man was also arrested as part of the investigation but has since been released on police bail pending further enquiries. Police said a man was seen fleeing the scene with a knife before returning without it. Investigators are combing the area for the weapon, however they have asked the public to be vigilant and report anything suspicious to their officers. Police can be contacted on 101 or information can also be provided anonymously to the independent charity, Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111. Relatives of the 11 people killed in the Enniskillen bombing have vowed to keep their memories alive and continue fighting for justice as they mark the 30th anniversary of the atrocity. The IRA bomb exploded without warning ahead of a Remembrance Sunday memorial ceremony on November 8, 1987, in one of the worst attacks of the Troubles. Read More Eleven people lost their lives and scores more were injured on the day. A 12th person died in December 2000 after 13 years in a coma due to injuries sustained in the attack. The device was planted in a building close to the Cenotaph and when it detonated the walls collapsed on top of those who had gathered to pay respects to the war dead. No one has ever been brought to justice for the massacre. Joan Anderson, whose parents William and Agnes Mullan were killed, said: "You have to learn to live with it or else you're another victim, and I refuse to be another victim. "You heal to a point, but it's inside you and it never leaves. Every day of my life I miss my parents. "I can say that, after 30 years, you finally get to the point where you can accept that it happened, but you do not forget and I am still angry about it. "I'm angry that, right across Northern Ireland, good people have been killed and we have been forgotten about." Aileen Quinton, whose mother Alberta was killed, said: "It's so hard to believe that it's been 30 years. There's just an unreality about it. "At the time it just felt too awful to be true and in many ways it still is. "I'm no more used to it. It's still awful and it still matters." Stella Robinson, whose mother and father Bertha and Wesley Armstrong died, said: "I think people born after the Troubles or after 1996 (the year of the IRA ceasefire) are not educated enough about what happened. I think they just want people to move on and they don't want to be reminded. "But I just don't want this to be forgotten about. They were taken from us and I want people to know. "I was very close to both my parents and they meant the world to me. I really miss them and I was robbed of 30 years of their life with me." A memorial unveiling and dedication service organised by the Ely Centre, which has supported the families of the bereaved and injured in their efforts to erect a permanent memorial, will take place in the town today. The service will commence at 10.30am and will occur on the site of the explosion. Ahead of the anniversary, the PSNI said it remained committed to bringing to justice those responsible for the bombing. Detective Superintendent Ian Harrison, from the PSNI's Legacy Investigation Branch, said that if investigative options arise, officers will pursue them. "Since the initial investigation into the bomb attack on the memorial service at Enniskillen in 1987 a number of case reviews and further investigative actions have been undertaken by police," he said. "Ten persons were arrested and interviewed during the course of the original investigation and subsequently released due to insufficient evidence to support a prosecution. "In 2016 one person was rearrested and interviewed by detectives from Serious Crime Branch. "The individual was later released without charge due to insufficient evidence. "The PSNI remains committed to pursuing investigative options, should they develop in the future. The murders at the Enniskillen Cenotaph remain within the extensive caseload of Legacy Investigation Branch for future review. "If a new historical investigation unit is established as part of political developments, the case files will pass to that body." Stephen Gault was standing next to his father when the bomb went off. Samuel was killed and Stephen was left severely injured. He said: "I have been in Enniskillen in the days leading up to the 30th anniversary and noticed a large amount of police officers carrying out searches around the Cenotaph. "It hit home then that another anniversary is here, but it made me think that if that type of search was carried out before the bomb then we wouldn't have to deal with this. "All this hype around the anniversary brings me back to reality and it's very difficult. "You learn to live with it, but it's still very raw." Dr KC files RTI petition at Office of President Dr Govinda KC has filed a right to information (RTI) petition demanding to know why the Office of the President is delaying in endorsing the Health Profession Education (HPE) Ordinance. Eleven people were killed in the blast and scores more were injured James Brokenshire, left, looks on as Stephen Gault, whose father Samuel was killed in the Enniskillen bombing, lays a wreath The people of Enniskillen have joined together to remember their loved ones, 30 years after one of the darkest days of the Troubles . Several hundred people gathered for a memorial service on Wednesday morning at the town's cenotaph, where an IRA bomb exploded on November 8 1987, killing 12 civilians and injuring more than 70. Survivors and families of those who died were joined by dignitaries including Secretary of State James Brokenshire, Chief Constable George Hamilton and political representatives. The Rev David Cupples, of Enniskillen Church, told the crowd how the terrible events of 30 years ago had "changed the lives of everyone who was here that day and who are here today". He said 12 people, who were beloved family members, friends and neighbours, were "slain by the hands of wicked men". He spoke of the pain of the "shattered hopes and dreams" and the "struggle to carry on day by day" that many still face. A hush fell over the town as a memorial bearing the names of the 12 dead was unveiled and wreaths were laid. In a written message read by Viscount Brookeborough, the Queen sent renewed sympathies to the families and victims. She said: "I am aware of the irreplaceable loss and profound sadness shared by so many families who lost their loved ones and of all those who were injured. "I renew my sympathy with you all on this occasion. Whilst this memorial will serve your community as a permanent reminder of that tragic day it is my hope that by it the families who have suffered will be strengthened in the knowledge that those who lost their lives and the injured are never forgotten." Following the service Stephen Ross, who was seriously injured in the bombing, said he felt no bitterness or anger towards those behind the atrocity. "I hold no grudges and I am able to ask God to forgive. I have no sense of bitterness. It only eats you up and consumes you. Being angry and being focused on that anger does nobody any good," he told the Press Association. Mr Ross added: "It is a miracle I am still alive today. It is painful looking back but you get to stand with other people who have walked through difficult times, who have had to walk through their injuries and loss. "It is difficult standing on the site. You still remember everything that happened on the day. I don't think anyone will be able to erase those memories." He added that Christian faith helps him "rise above" the pain and move on. A service of remembrance was later held for invited guests in Enniskillen Presbyterian Church. Ryanair is to reinstate its Belfast to London service a month early. Pilot rostering issues meant some 700,000 passengers were affected by Ryanair's decision to drop numerous routes including suspending its Belfast to Gatwick route for the winter. On Wednesday the company announced the London service would resume on March. However, instead of flying to Gatwick, as it had previously, it will now travel to Stansted. The company also launched its summer 2018 schedule of 14 flights out of Northern Ireland. The airline said: "Ryanair will deliver lower fares and an even better customer experience as it rolls out year four of its 'Always Getting Better' customer experience programme, including a new Ryanair Rooms website, Ryanair concert tickets, Apple Pay integration, long haul Air Europa flights on sale on Ryanair.com and a new partnership with the Erasmus Student Network." The PSNI has around 7,000 officers and members of the force are routinely armed because of the terrorism threat A security alert at Grand Parade in east Belfast has ended. A number of items have been removed for examination. Police and army bomb experts were both at the scene near Orangefield Park. DUP MLA Joanne Bunting posted on Twitter the "alert was over quickly." The east Belfast representative added: "Cars are still not permitted in the street." One third of Disability Living Allowance (DLA) claimants in Northern Ireland have had their benefit stopped after reassessment for the Personal Independence Payment (PIP). One third of Disability Living Allowance (DLA) claimants in Northern Ireland have had their benefit stopped after reassessment for the Personal Independence Payment (PIP). Figures obtained by BBC Spotlight programme broadcast on Tuesday showed that 7,704 claimants were disallowed. PIP was introduced in Northern Ireland in June 2016 as part of welfare changes agreed by the Northern Ireland Executive. It is paid to people who face extra costs due to ill health or disability. Assessments are being carried out in Northern Ireland until December 2018 on current DLA recipients aged between 16 and 64, and just over 21,000 reassessments had been completed by the end of July 2017. In a statement to the BBC, the Department of Communities said the process was in "very early days" and 125,000 claimants still need to be assessed. Assessments for PIP claims are carried out on behalf of the Department for Communities by outsourcing company Capita, although it is the decision of the Department whether or not individuals are awarded benefits, and the value of the award. The company carry out assessments aimed at determining a person's ability to "undertake everyday mobility and daily living activities". It is not contracted by the Department for Communities to determine a person's impairment or health condition. A Capita spokesperson told the Belfast Telegraph: "Our disability assessors are healthcare professionals equipped with the knowledge, skills and training set out by the Department for Communities to conduct functional-based PIP assessments across Northern Ireland. "We are committed to delivering accurate high-quality reports and ensure this through comprehensive training and ongoing specialist support for our healthcare professionals, as well as having a robust audit process in place." Customers unhappy with the result of their PIP assessment can lodge a reconsideration request. If this is unsuccessful, customers can appeal to an Independent Tribunal. In a statement to the Belfast Telegraph, the Department of Communities said: "A number of mitigation schemes to support people who lose out financially as a result of the changes including those transitioning from DLA to PIP and one of these schemes supports people with a payment until the appeal is determined." Veteran broadcaster Ken Reid has revealed that he has been diagnosed with cancer. The UTV political editor, who has been absent from our television screens for some weeks, was recently told he has leukaemia. Ken, who has worked at the station for more than 25 years, said the illness was discovered "by accident". The dad-of-three posted on Facebook last night: "Some of you have noticed my absence from the box. "There is a reason. "Some weeks ago, by accident, it was discovered I had a form of leukaemia. "It was, of course, a shock. A period in hospital followed. "It is treatable and I'm now undergoing tests to see the best way forward. "The point of this post is to thank my family and friends for their support. "Each and everyone of you has been magnificent and a source of great encouragement. "Thank you. Some tough times ahead." Politicians and fellow broadcasters wished him well in his recovery. Ivan Little, who previously worked with Mr Reid at UTV, said: "I want to wish Ken a speedy recovery. "Ken's absence from our television screens with his guide through various political crises has been very noticeable." DUP leader Arlene Foster said: "I was aware that Ken was unwell and had sent him some words of encouragement recently assuring him that he is in our prayers. Ken's objective analysis and wealth of experience has been sorely missed at Stormont whilst he has been unwell. "I wish him all the very best and hope that he'll be back posing those tough questions again soon." Ulster Unionist Belfast City councillor Jim Rodgers wrote on Facebook: "Ken I had missed you on the box and sorry to hear this news. "Will remember you in my thoughts and prayers. "If I can be of any help to you please don't hesitate to contact me." SDLP MLA Patsy McGlone and former Justice Minister Claire Sugden were also among those wishing him well. Ms Sugden said: "Very best wishes to you Ken. Thinking of you and stay strong." West Tyrone SDLP MLA Daniel McCrossan said: "Best wishes and a full and healthy recovery to you Ken." Former South Down MP Margaret Ritchie said: "Thinking of you. Keep strong. Look forward to seeing you back on the box giving your political analysis." Public inquiry Renewable Heat Incentive scheme begins. Left to right. Statutory Inquiry Panel Member Dame Una O'Brien, Chairman Sir Patrick Coghlin and Technical Assessor to the Inquiry Dr Keith MacLean take their seats as the inquiry begins. Photo by Jonathan Porter / Press Eye. Allegations of incompetence and corruption around a botched green energy scheme in Northern Ireland have left many taxpayers questioning whether hundreds of millions of pounds of public money went up in smoke, a public inquiry has been told. The furore over the renewable heat incentive (RHI) affair reached such a "fever pitch" that it struck at the very heart of the region's democratic institutions, triggering the collapse of powersharing at Stormont, a lawyer for the inquiry said. Read More Delivering his opening statement on the first day of the high profile independent probe, David Scoffield QC said "explosive" claims of political interference and improper patronage would be examined in forensic detail. The inquiry will investigate the design and operation of the ill-fated RHI scheme, an eco-friendly state subsidy initiative that left the Stormont administration facing a potential 700 million overspend bill. "It is hard to find a taxpayer in Northern Ireland who does not have questions to ask about how a scheme intended to do so much good turned out to have an unplanned bill of such proportions as to threaten other public spending priorities, apparently well into the future," Mr Scoffield said. The RHI was established to incentivise businesses to shift to renewable energy sources by offering a proportion of the costs to run eco-friendly boilers. But in Northern Ireland the subsidy tariffs were set too high and without a cap, so it ended up paying out significantly more than the price of fuel. This effectively enabled some applicants to "burn to earn", getting free heat and making a profit as they did so. Along with claims of incompetent handling of the scheme there have been more damning corruption allegations that steps to clamp down on the costs were subject to inappropriate political obstruction, with the intent of enabling others to benefit from the generous terms. Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) leader Arlene Foster's role in the RHI scheme was at the heart of the row that brought down the Sinn Fein/DUP coalition government in Belfast. She had a central role in establishing the RHI during her time as Stormont economy minister. The DUP leader and former first minister, who will not be called to give evidence to the inquiry until next year, has insisted she acted correctly throughout. A series of DUP party advisers, who have all rejected allegations of wrongdoing, will also appear before the probe chaired by retired judge Sir Patrick Coghlin. Sir Patrick told the opening hearing at Parliament Buildings, Stormont, that the inquiry team has already examined one million pieces of documentary evidence. "This inquiry was established in the wake of a media and political turmoil during which strongly worded allegations and repudiations were exchanged," he said. "The inquiry was set up to provide a measured, objective, independent and publicly transparent investigation of the facts in accordance with the terms of the reference and that is what this inquiry shall seek to do." Mrs Foster's refusal to accede to Sinn Fein's demand that she step aside as first minister pending the outcome of an inquiry prompted the late Martin McGuinness to resign as Sinn Fein deputy first minister in January, forcing the collapse of powersharing. In the wake of the RHI furore, Sinn Fein repeatedly stated its unwillingness to return to devolved coalition government at Stormont with Mrs Foster as first minister until her actions were examined by the inquiry. That demand has somewhat faded into the background as the powersharing impasse has been overtaken by a row over the Irish language. Mr Scoffield noted there was "precious little" in the scope of the inquiry that was "uncontentious". He said the inquiry would not deliberate on whether Mr McGuinness's resignation was justified. But the barrister added: "It is undoubtedly part of the RHI story, that concern about what happened with this scheme reached such fever pitch that it struck at the very heart of our democratic institutions." The said the RHI scheme had caught the public imagination in part due to allegations of "incompetence, corruption and improper patronage". Mr Scoffield added: "The notion that money might be going up in smoke which could otherwise pay for doctors, nurses, teachers, policemen and so on has been anathema to many in the public." The barrister made clear it was not the inquiry's function to determine civil or criminality liability. He said the probe would also not be assessing whether all the individual RHI applicants were using it legitimately. Mr Scoffield also referred to the explosive TV interview last December with former DUP economy minister Jonathan Bell who broke cover to level a series of allegations against Mrs Foster and DUP party advisers. The lawyer said it was "probably unprecedented" in contemporary Northern Ireland politics for a former minister to turn on party colleagues in such a way. He revealed the inquiry has secured texts and emails that were exchanged among politicians and officials in the wake of Mr Bell's interview. Mr Scoffield said the inquiry was not concerned with the "political drama and theatre" of the episode but with the claims made by Mr Bell. The RHI scheme was closed to new applicants when the scale of the overspend bill emerged, however Mr Bell alleged DUP advisers delayed this action. After the eventual closure, Stormont ministers then took action to cut the tariffs they had pledged to pay in long-term contracts, a move currently being challenged by RHI boiler owners in the courts. Mr Scoffield said many had been left "aggrieved" by the scheme, noting there were those in the renewables sector who felt the government "broke faith". The inquiry will also focus on how whistleblower claims on the RHI were handled. The opening session heard that one key whistleblower's application for anonymity had been declined by Sir Patrick. Mr Scoffield confirmed that Mrs Foster and Mr Bell would not be called to give evidence until the "very end" of the inquiry's hearings. This is expected to be well into 2018. The barrister noted there would be those who would like to see the appearance of certain witnesses "fast forwarded" to an earlier date. He said the sequencing of witnesses was a matter for the inquiry and would be determined solely on what was most conducive to its work, not on "other considerations". Mr Scoffield's statement is scheduled to last three days. After his opening remarks, the lawyer spent the remainder of the first day outlining in detail the chronology of events around the creation of the scheme. November 2012 The renewable scheme is implemented to help non-domestic and business properties to install more environmentally friendly heating systems. It is overseen by then Enterprise Minister Arlene Foster. 2013 First communications received by DETI from a whistle-blower who alleges that the scheme is being abused. No cap is placed on the subsidy; the more heat generated the higher the payout. One allegation highlights that a farmer could have claimed 1m over 20 years for heating an empty barn. 2014 The RHI scheme is rolled out to domestic properties. 2015 As applications for the scheme swell, DETI must seek re-approval for the scheme from the Department of Finance. Administration oversight is blamed for its failure to do so. February 2016 The overspend is alleged to have reached millions of pounds and an investigation now begins. Industry Minister Jonathan Bell announces that no further applications will be accepted. July 2016 The Audit Office says serious systemic failings would hit the Northern Ireland budget to the tune of hundreds of millions of pounds. Economy Minister Simon Hamilton (DUP) says the ongoing costs of the scheme to taxpayers are incredible. October 2016 Senior members of Ofgem E-Serve which administers RHI appear before the assemblys Public Accounts Committee. The panel heard that in a period of 15 months no minutes had been recorded of formal meetings between themselves and departmental officials. December 8, 2016 SDLP leader Colum Eastwood calls on Mrs Foster to appear before the Public Accounts Committee. December 12, 2016 The DUP leader declares she has nothing to hide and aims to restore public confidence by writing to claimants asking if their names can be publicised. December 14, 2016 Stormonts first and deputy first ministers ask for the Northern Ireland Assembly to be recalled to discuss the botched heat scheme. December 15, 2016 Mr Bell claims that senior DUP aides tried to remove Mrs Fosters name from documents. The claim is denied by both Mrs Foster and the two advisers he accused. December 21, 2016 Closure of the RHI scheme is now considered. The proposal would incur costs after buying out claimants to reduce the final bill. January 4, 2017 Rival political parties call for Arlene Foster to stand down. She refuses to do so. January 9, 2017 Martin McGuinness resigns as deputy first minister in protest at the DUPs handling of the RHI scandal. January 13, 2017 Ofgem inspectors say they have suspended payments at 33 of the 63 boilers they have audited. January 16, 2017 An assembly election is called after Sinn Fein refuses to nominate a deputy first minister to succeed Mr McGuinness. January 19, 2017 Dr Andrew Crawford, a former aid to Arlene Foster, resigns after claims he exerted influence over the scheme. January 23, 2017 New rules are put in place to reduce payments to claimants to save 30m in the 2017/18 budget. January 24, 2017 A public inquiry into the RHI scandal, to be chaired by retired appeal court judge Sir Patrick Coghlin, is announced. March 1, 2017 A judge rules the Department for the Economy can publish details of businesses receiving subsidies from the scheme. April 27, 2017 The preliminary hearing of the RHI inquiry takes place at Stormont. May 24, 2017 A list of companies involved in the scheme is published. It includes 821 claimants who shared a total of 62m over five years. June 30, 2017 A plan to inspect the 2,100 boiler installations is shelved. August 6, 2017 The Department for the Economy says it intends to seek a 12-month extension of its rules to cut the schemes cost, originally implemented for one year from April. September 18, 2017 Mrs Foster is given special rights which allow her to access witness statements. The inquiry is delayed. October 2017 RHI claimants exert a legal challenge against the Department for the Economy to stop it reducing the schemes tariff payments. Judgment is reserved. November 7, 2017 The public inquiry into the RHI scheme opens. The Prince of Wales has held talks with Indias prime minister, but the meeting has been overshadowed by reports suggesting Charles benefited financially from lobbying on climate change. The New Delhi meeting between Charles and Narendra Modi the leader of the worlds biggest democracy had been billed as an important event ahead of a major gathering of Commonwealth leaders next year. But reports by the BBC and the Guardian that Charles invested in an offshore carbon credit trading company, then lobbied for two climate change deals to be altered, has taken attention away from the event. 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 The prince is now facing calls for him to register all his interests to prevent secrecy surrounding his private estate. India is the last leg of an 11-day trip, which has seen Charles and Camilla tour Singapore, Malaysia and Brunei. Although the stop in the Commonwealth country is brief, just two days, the meeting with Mr Modi, 15 minutes of talks that were followed by a private dinner with a handful of guests, is significant. Charles has spoken of his passion for the Commonwealth during the tour, and with the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting being held in London next April, the night of talks and dining will further strengthen UK-India relations ahead of the summit. Expand Close The Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi (Yui Mok/PA) PA Wire/PA Images / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp The Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi (Yui Mok/PA) It is understood the two men discussed the common issues of the Commonwealth and sustainability. The claims against Charles were prompted by the leaked Paradise Papers which revealed the princes Duchy of Cornwall estate almost tripled the value of its shares in an offshore carbon credit trading company when they were sold in 2008 for 246,000. After the shares had been purchased in 2007, Charles, an environmentalist for decades, gave speeches highlighting his views on the credits. The prince wanted the Kyoto Protocol and the EUs Emissions Trading Scheme to include rainforest credits traded by the firm which were largely excluded from the major deals. Charles effectively wanted a financial mechanism to help safeguard the threatened habitats. 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 On Tuesday a spokesman for Clarence House denied that Charles had spoken out on the two deals in order to benefit financially. The prince has never chosen to speak out on a topic simply because of a company that the Duchy may have invested in, he said. In the case of climate change his views are well known, indeed he has been warning of the threat of global warming to our environment for over 30 years. The spokesman added that carbon markets were just one of many strategies Charles had championed to try to slow the pace of climate change. EU launches poll observation mission The European Union has launched the European Union Election Observation Mission (EU EOM) for the elections to the House of Representatives and the Provincial Assemblies. Taoiseach Leo Varadkar in the Dail with a lapel pin combining poppy with a shamrock The traditional red poppy sold to remember Britain's war dead and to raise money for veterans is facing growing competition - although not without controversy. White poppies, a new shamrock-style poppy and 'bling' designer poppies have all made their mark in recent days. Northern Ireland broadcaster Christine Lampard sparked debate when she sported a white poppy on ITV's Loose Women. According to the Peace Pledge Union, they "represent remembrance for all victims of war, a commitment to peace and a challenge to attempts to glamorise or celebrate war". Christine's decision was criticised and defended in equal measure. One viewer wrote on Twitter: "Wearing the white poppy is disrespectful to the men who died for us." Pauline Ditch added: "I think this is disgusting as it is supposed to be red so everyone should wear red. My grandad was in that war so red it is." But Noreen Gill wrote: "In my opinion poppies should be red. But I suppose people are entitled to their own opinion and wear what colour they want." Another viewer responded: No 'suppose' about it. The right to do so is bigger than anything a poppy represents." Sarah Montrose added: "Indeed, our servicemen fight for our freedom to do so!" Meanwhile, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has worn an Irish-themed red poppy badge to commemorate the island's war dead. He wore the Shamrock Poppy in the Dail yesterday. The move is symbolic of the greater recognition now afforded in the Republic to those Irishmen who fought and died serving in the British Army in the First World War, in the years prior to independence. Given the Irish state's troubled history with Britain, the red poppy has never been embraced as a symbol of remembrance in the country. A spokesman for the Taoiseach said he had been given the Shamrock Poppy by a Fine Gael senator. "The Shamrock Poppy recognises Irish soldiers who fought in World War I," he said. "It was commissioned to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Great War by the Irish branch of the Royal British Legion to remember the 206,000 Irishmen that fought, 26,500 of whom died in battle. "Proceeds from the Shamrock Poppy go to Irish veterans and their families, and towards the upkeep to memorials to Irish soldiers in Ireland. All money stays in Ireland." Recent years have seen an explosion of 'bling' poppies, which have been criticised for turning an expression of remembrance into fashion statements. A few years ago, celebrities on the X Factor faced criticism for wearing designer emblems studded with crystals - although the money went to the annual Poppy Day appeal. Administrators for failed airline Monarch are seeking an urgent appeal after losing a High Court battle over valuable runway slots it wants to exchange with other carriers to raise cash for creditors. Two judges in London gave a ruling on Wednesday against the ill-fated airline which went into administration on October 2. Blair Nimmo, partner at KPMG and joint administrator, said: We are disappointed with todays ruling and will be seeking leave to appeal as a matter of urgency. 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 The collapse of Monarch, which was owned by private equity firm Greybull Capital, led to 1,858 workers being made redundant and the flights and holidays of about 860,000 people being cancelled. At the heart of the judicial review action by Monarch Airlines Ltd (MAL) was a decision by Airport Co-ordination Ltd (ACL) not to allocate certain take-off and landing slots to the airline for the summer 2018 season. Lord Justice Gross and Mr Justice Lewis heard argument from Monarchs administrators that if received, those slots would represent its most valuable asset, which it would seek to exchange with other airlines to realise value for its creditors. A QC argued that the approach taken by ACL was unlawful, submitting: ACL has no lawful power to refuse to allocate these slots or to reserve them pending determination of proposals to revoke or suspend MALs operating licence. But the judges rejected Monarchs claim that ACL was under a duty to allocate the summer 2018 slots to Monarch by reason of historical precedence. Lord Justice Gross said: Whatever flexibility and discretion ACL enjoys in other circumstances to reserve (or postpone) a decision, it is no longer entitled to reserve its decision on the summer 2018 slots on the facts of this case. That would be to sterilise or distort part of the market, to the potential detriment of third parties, for an uncertain period of time. The judge declared: Accordingly, the consequence of our decision is that the summer 2018 slots are to be placed in the slot pool. After further legal argument following the announcement of the courts ruling, the judges adjourned a decision on whether to grant Monarch permission to appeal until they give a full judgment on the action on a date to be fixed. On Wednesday they only announced their decision with brief reasons. They refused a stay on their order in respect of Manchester and Birmingham airports, but granted one in relation to Gatwick and Luton until November 17, or until further order. A Greybull spokesman said: The legal case deals with novel and complex issues. In practice this is a matter for KPMG acting as administrators to manage. Greybull can do little more than await the outcome of the administration process. Critics say events since the June election have exposed Theresa May's weakness and inability to impose authority on a fractious and divided Government (Stefan Rousseau/PA) The question marks over Priti Patels future as International Development Secretary have added to the sense of turmoil surrounding Theresa Mays Cabinet. If Ms Patel is sacked on her return to the UK from Africa, she would become the second member of the Prime Ministers top team to lose their job in a week, after Sir Michael Fallon walked the plank last Wednesday over allegations of improper advances to female journalists. Mrs May presented herself at the June general election as the strong and stable candidate, but critics say that events since then have exposed a weakness and inability to impose authority on a fractious and divided Government. Expand Close Priti Patel (Yui Mok/PA) PA Wire/PA Images / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Priti Patel (Yui Mok/PA) An expected reshuffle following the Conservative annual conference failed to materialise, as the PM found herself buffeted between the demands of rival sides of her party for the heads of Chancellor Philip Hammond or Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson. And the sexual harassment scandal swirling around Westminster has cost her one loyal supporter and raised doubts about the future of other Government members. Here are some of the people at the centre of the storm: Sir Michael Fallon Expand Close Sir Michael Fallon (Leon neal/PA) PA Wire/PA Images / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Sir Michael Fallon (Leon neal/PA) Known as a safe pair of hands, the Sevenoaks MP quit as defence secretary on November 1 after allegations of wandering hands. Sir Michael, 65, initially apologised for touching the knee of radio presenter Julia Hartley-Brewer 15 years ago, but then resigned after further allegations he had attempted to kiss another journalist. Sir Michael admitted he had fallen below the high standards that we require of the armed forces. Priti Patel A rising star who reached Cabinet rank just six years after entering Parliament as MP for Witham in 2010, Ms Patel blotted her copybook by undertaking a number of political meetings, including with PM Benjamin Netanyahu, while on holiday in Israel without notifying the Foreign Office. Hauled in for a dressing-down by Mrs May, she compounded her offence by failing to tell the Prime Minister about all of her contacts with Israeli figures, and later reports suggested she may even have visited the occupied Golan Heights. If she is returned to the backbenches, the 45-year-old passionate Brexiteer may become a focus for Eurosceptic Tories who feel Mrs May is not being tough enough in negotiating the UKs withdrawal from the EU. Boris Johnson Expand Close Boris Johnson (Chris J Ratcliffe/PA) PA Wire/PA Images / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Boris Johnson (Chris J Ratcliffe/PA) There had already been pressure for Mr Johnsons removal as Foreign Secretary after he set out personal red lines for the Brexit negotiations in what was widely seen as an attempt to influence the Prime Ministers crunch Florence speech on EU withdrawal. Now he is facing calls for his head after being forced to issue a clarification of inaccurate comments to a parliamentary committee, which risk lengthening the prison sentence of a British woman jailed in Iran. Critics of Mrs May say her fear of Mr Johnson, 53, becoming a Brexit standard-bearer on the backbenches has made him effectively unsackable. But he is also a target of opponents of a hard Brexit over his often-repeated claim, branded misleading by the official statistician, that quitting the EU would free up 350 a million a week which could be spent on the NHS. Damian Green Expand Close Damian Green (David Cheskin/PA) PA Wire/PA Images / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Damian Green (David Cheskin/PA) Mrs Mays closest Cabinet ally and effective deputy is being investigated by the Cabinet Office over allegations that he made inappropriate advances to a young female activist in 2015. The inquiry was later expanded to consider claims that extreme pornography was found by police on his work computer in 2008. The 61-year-old MP for Ashford denies all the allegations. If he is forced out of the Government, his departure would be a massive blow to Mrs May, who has known him since her student years and made him her number two to shore up her shaky position following the botched snap election. Philip Hammond 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 The Chancellor is approaching a crunch Budget on November 22 with his party divided over the direction economic policy should take. With colleagues like Communities Secretary Sajid Javid openly calling for new borrowing to fund priorities such as house-building, and the Chancellor himself admitting voters are weary of austerity, an attempt to keep a tight hand on the purse strings could prove deeply unpopular in his own party. Eurosceptic Tories have agitated for the removal of the 61-year-old Chancellor, who they suspect of harbouring Remain sympathies after he campaigned for Britain to stay in the EU last year. He has been branded an Eeyore for his warnings of the potential economic damage of a disorderly exit from the EU. Gavin Williamson Expand Close New Secretary of State for Defence Gavin Williamson holds a collection bucket for the Poppy Appeal at Waterloo Station (Victoria Jones/PA) PA Wire/PA Images / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp New Secretary of State for Defence Gavin Williamson holds a collection bucket for the Poppy Appeal at Waterloo Station (Victoria Jones/PA) The elevation of Mrs Mays chief whip to Cabinet rank at the age of 41 without ever having held ministerial office sparked a wave of indignation among Tory ranks. Mostly speaking off the record, MPs suggested that Mrs May had shown her weakness by picking a defence secretary from among her small inner circle of trusted loyalists, rather than basing her selection on experience and proven ability. The tarantula-owning South Staffordshire MP came under attack for his supposed ambition and ruthlessness, with comparisons drawn with fictional Westminster enforcer Francis Urquhart from TVs House Of Cards. Andrea Leadsom Expand Close Andrea Leadsom (David Mirzoeff/PA) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Andrea Leadsom (David Mirzoeff/PA) The Leader of the Commons was Mrs Mays final rival for the Conservative leadership in last years battle to succeed David Cameron, before withdrawing from the contest amid controversy over her claim that being a mother would help equip her for the job. The 54-year-old Northamptonshire South MP has not been the subject of any allegations, but was drawn into the Pestminster furore following newspaper claims that she complained to Mrs May about off-colour remarks from Sir Michael Fallon. Sir Michael categorically denied making the reported comments, and Downing Street insisted that Ms Leadsom did not ask for his dismissal. Labour wants to know how much - and when - Theresa May knew about Ms Patel's secret meetings (Joe Giddens/PA) Prime Minister Theresa May faced questions about the Governments knowledge of Priti Patels unofficial Israel meetings following her resignation as international development secretary. Labour is set to continue pressing for more information about how much and when the Prime Minister knew about Ms Patels secret meetings with senior Israeli figures. Shadow international development secretary Kate Osamor said Mrs May must either get control of her decaying government following the resignation of Ms Patel or step aside and let Labour govern. 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 And deputy Labour leader Tom Watson has written to Mrs May demanding answers about officials knowledge of Ms Patels activities during a holiday in Israel in August. Ms Osamor said: Priti Patel appears to have breached the Ministerial Code, gone behind the Governments back, and misled the British public. After initially denying the allegations, then repeatedly changing her story and failing to disclose all of her meetings, it is right that she has now resigned. But we still need to know what was discussed in these meetings and what Number 10 and the Foreign Office knew and when. Theresa May must get control of her chaotic cabinet and decaying government or step aside for Labour to govern for the many not the few. Deputy Labour leader Tom Watson has written to Mrs May demanding answers on what the Government knew about Ms Patels meetings during her private holiday in Israel in August, which lasted from August 13 to 25. 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 In his letter he said: I have been informed that while she was in Israel, Ms Patel met officials from the British consulate general Jerusalem, but that the fact of this meeting has not been made public. If this were the case, then it would surely be impossible to sustain the claim that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office was not aware of Ms Patels presence in Israel. The existence of such a meeting or meetings would call into question the official account of Ms Patels behaviour, and the purpose of her visit. Middle East Minister Alistair Burt told MPs on Tuesday that Foreign Office officials in Israel were made aware of Ms Patels visit on August 24 and it was likely that her meetings had taken place beforehand. 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 Ms Patel only made Mrs May aware of the meetings on Friday, more than two months after they took place, when reports began to emerge of talks she held with a politician and a disability charity. Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokeswoman Jo Swinson said: Priti Patel has rightly been forced to step down for her cover up of meetings with foreign officials and the inappropriate requests for aid to be sent to the Israeli military in the Golan Heights. This was an appalling error of judgment and is nothing short of a major failure by the British government. Number 10 must answer questions about their complicity in this scandal. Someone has been deceived, either the British people or the Prime Ministers office. Whichever it is someone must be held to account. It is right that Patel has gone but Theresa Mays office now needs to reveal honestly what they knew and when. The SNPs Westminster leader, Ian Blackford, said: This has been utterly humiliating for the Prime Minister. Theresa May couldnt manage a resignation without making a global shambles of it. Priti Patel met Israeli public security minister Gilad Erdan in Parliament on September 7 and foreign ministry official Yuval Rotem in New York on September 18 (Dominic Lipinski/PA) Priti Patel has quit the Cabinet over her secret meetings with senior Israeli figures and acknowledged that her actions fell below the high standards expected. Her decision to resign as International Development Secretary came after being summoned back from an official visit to Africa for a showdown with Theresa May in Downing Street. The Prime Minister has now lost two Cabinet ministers in successive weeks and will face a politically sensitive reshuffle to replace the prominent Brexit-backer. 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 Ms Patel had been intending to spend three days in Kenya and Uganda, but was forced to cut short her trip and return home from Nairobi to explain the disclosure of further unauthorised meetings with Israeli politicians. In a letter to the Prime Minister, Ms Patel said: I offer a fulsome apology to you and to the Government for what has happened and offer my resignation. In reply the Prime Minister told her that meetings should have been arranged formally and through official channels. Witham MP Ms Patels downfall came after it emerged she had a series of 12 engagements with senior Israeli figures including prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a holiday in the country in August. 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 She then held two additional meetings, one in the UK and one in the US, following her return from Israel. In a further development, the Israeli Haaretz newspaper reported that during her stay in the country she visited an Israeli military field hospital in the occupied Golan Heights. Britain, like other members of the international community, has never recognised Israeli control of the area seized from Syria in the 1967 Six-Day War. 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 In her resignation letter Ms Patel said: In recent days there have been a number of reports about my actions and I am sorry that these have served as a distraction from the work of the Department for International Development and of the Government as a whole. As you know from our discussions I accept that in meeting with organisations and politicians during a private holiday in Israel my actions fell below the high standards that are expected of a Secretary of State. While my actions were meant with the best of intentions, my actions also fell below the standards of transparency and openness that I have promoted and advocated. 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 The meetings, without officials and in relation to one of the most sensitive areas of foreign policy, led to Ms Patel apologising and being given a dressing down by Mrs May on Monday. But subsequent disclosures added to pressure on Ms Patel, culminating in a meeting in Downing Street lasting around 30 minutes during which it was made clear her Cabinet career was over. 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 In her letter to Ms Patel, the Prime Minister said said: As you know, the UK and Israel are close allies, and it is right that we should work closely together. But that must be done formally, and through official channels. That is why, when we met on Monday, I was glad to accept your apology and welcomed your clarification about the trip to Israel over the summer. Now that further details have come to light, it is right that you have decided to resign and adhere to the high standards of transparency and openness that you have advocated. Fay Marshall was unveiled as Slimming World's Woman of the Year A student from London has told how she lost 8st 8lbs after she was mistaken for being pregnant on the tube. Fay Marshall (23) tipped the scales at 21st 5lbs and wore a size 22 - but is now Slimming World's Woman of the Year. "It became a bit of a vicious cycle. The bigger I got, the less confident I became and the more I stayed in to eat and eat. "On two occasions I was mistaken for a pregnant lady on the tube - I was so embarrassed. "Having to explain that I wasn't actually pregnant was bad enough, but I also knew I probably wouldn't fit in the seat they'd offered me anyway. I cried and cried, and never told anyone what had happened." Fay's grandmother Pam Marshall suggested she sign up to a slimming club with her. They joined Slimming World and Fay quickly shed the pounds. "Before, whenever I walked into a room I would feel as though everyone was looking at me and thinking 'wow, she's a big girl!' Now I can walk into any room with my head held high," she said. Boris Johnson will spend two days on Capitol Hill for meetings with the likes of US House of Representatives speaker Paul Ryan and majority leader Kevin McCarthy (Chris J Ratcliffe/PA) Boris Johnson will attempt to persuade United States politicians not to quit the Iran nuclear deal amid a political firestorm at home over his remarks about a British woman jailed in the middle eastern country. Ahead of meetings with congressional leaders in Washington DC, Mr Johnson said supporting the agreement does not mean ignoring disruptive Iranian behaviour such as the unjustified detention of British nationals. The Foreign Secretarys attempts at diplomacy on Iran come with him facing calls to quit over his comments about British woman Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe. Mr Johnson told a committee of MPs last week that Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe was training journalists, rather than holidaying, in Iran at the time of her arrest last year, something her employer and family insist is incorrect. Amid fears his comments may have led the Iranian authorities to try to extend her five-year jail sentence for supposed involvement in a coup plot, Mr Johnson on Tuesday admitted he could have been clearer and was sorry if his remarks were misconstrued. Expand Close Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe (Gareth Fuller/PA) PA Archive/PA Images / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe (Gareth Fuller/PA) He will now spend two days on Capitol Hill for meetings with the likes of US House of Representatives speaker Paul Ryan and majority leader Kevin McCarthy, as well as Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell. They come after President Donald Trump decertified the Iran deal, giving Congress the power to reimpose economic sanctions on Tehran which were lifted in return for limitations to its nuclear programme. 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 Johnson will stress the need to stick to the deal to stop Iran developing nuclear weapons. Speaking at the start of his visit, he said: The Iran nuclear deal makes the world safer. Thats why it is vital that the international community sticks to the deal. It is working and has, so far, resulted in Iran giving up 95% of its uranium stockpile. These are the points I will be making in my meetings in the United States this week. Supporting the nuclear deal does not mean we should not call out and take action against disruptive Iranian behaviour elsewhere, including its ballistic missile programme and the unjustified detention of British dual-nationals. However, it is vital that we do not conflate the issues on which we should rightly condemn Iran and a deal which is neutralising the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran. 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 It took 13 years of tireless diplomacy between the UK, US, our European partners and Iran to make the world a safer place. Now is not the moment to put that at risk but rather it is time for the US and UK to draw on the strength of our relationship and to focus on addressing Irans destabilising activity in the region. Mr Johnson will meet Republican senator Bob Corker, who has been critical of Mr Trump, as well as the chairmen and ranking members of the Senate Foreign Relations and House Foreign Affairs Committees, senator Ben Cardin and congressmen Ed Royce and Eliot Engel. Addressing criticism over his comments about Ms Zaghari-Ratcliffe in the Commons on Tuesday, Mr Johnson said the Government has no doubt that she was on holiday in Iran and that was the sole purpose of her visit. He insisted his remarks to the committee could provide no reason for lengthening her sentence. Before updating MPs, Mr Johnson told his Iranian counterpart Javad Zarif there was no justifiable basis for further legal action against the woman, who was summoned before an Iranian court on Saturday to be told she was now facing allegations of propaganda against the state. Her family fear this charge could lead to a further five years imprisonment. A Virginia politician has made US history by becoming the first openly transgender person to be elected to any state legislature in the country. Danica Roem beat Republican Bob Marshall, whod represented northern Virginia in the House of Delegates for 26 years, and this year proposed a Bill that would have have restricted which toilets Roem could use. Who is she? 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 The 33-year-old is a Democrat and former local news reporter who also sings in a metal band in her spare time. During the campaign Roem had to deal with being repeatedly misgendered by the notoriously conservative Marshall, who once described himself as chief homophobe, but also spoke openly about her gender. Roem focused on jobs, schools and, most prominently, northern Virginias traffic congestion, in one of this years most high-profile US elections. The northern Virginia resident has been vocal against Donald Trump, but was asked to run before he became president. 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 When Trump tried and failed to ban transgender people from the military, she said: It is nothing short of hypocrisy for someone unfit to serve honourably in the presidency to tell honourable, hard-working, patriotic Americans who answered their countrys call to service that they are unfit to serve because of who they are. The message that I can succeed because of my gender, not despite it, because of who I am without being afraid of who I am is a human message, Roem told Cosmopolitan in September. Its something that even if you are cisgender, but you have some reason that youve been singled out in your life you can look at me and say If she can do this, so can I. What has the reaction been like? Expand Close Danica Roem celebrates her win AP/PA Images / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Danica Roem celebrates her win The mood on social media has been celebratory. 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 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 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 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 People also used Roems victory to mention Althea Garrison, a transgender person who won a seat in Bostons legislature in 1992 before being subsequently outed by a Conservative newspaper. 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 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 Roem will take her seat in January but she wasnt the only transgender person to be elected on Tuesday. Tyler Titus, who is openly transgender, won a seat on a western Pennsylvania school board, The Erie Times-News reported. 2017 will be remembered as the year of the trans candidate and Danicas heroic run for office the centrepiece of that national movement, Aisha Moodie-Mills, president and chief executive of Victory Fund, said in a statement. Defeated Republican candidate for Virginia governor Ed Gillespie filling out his ballot at his polling place on Tuesday (AP Photo/Alex Brandon) US Democrat Ralph Northam has defeated Republican Ed Gillespie in the race for the governorship of Virginia, marking his party's first major Trump-era victory. The results in the state were replicated in several contests across America on Tuesday as the Trump resistance struck back at the US president's nationalist rhetoric. Mr Northam, a paediatric neurologist and Army veteran, led Mr Gillespie by several points as the final votes ticked in. Democrats also scored victories in the gubernatorial race for New Jersey and in Maine, where voters slapped the state's Republican governor, a Trump ally, by backing a measure to expand Medicaid coverage under former president Barack Obama's flagship health care law. The Democratic mayors of New York and Boston, both vocal Trump critics, also won re-election easily. Virginia voters also elected the state's first openly-transgender state representative, among more than a dozen state legislative gains for Democrats. The resounding victories marked the Republicans' most significant day of defeat in Donald Trump's presidency, as well as a rebuke to the leader himself as his party eyes a suddenly more threatening mid-term election season next year. Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez said: "The Democratic Party is back, my friends." As Democrats celebrated, Republicans pointed fingers. The president himself tweeted: "Ed Gillespie worked hard but did not embrace me or what I stand for." Mr Trump did note that his party won a handful of special elections earlier in the year, adding: "With the economy doing record numbers, we will continue to win, even bigger than before!" Despite the criticism, Mr Gillespie did, in many ways, embrace what Mr Trump stands for, even if he did not welcome the president into the state to rally voters on his behalf. Mr Trump played a marginal role in Virginia, largely because Republicans on the ground did not want him there, a state he lost last autumn, as his approval ratings hover near record lows. The White House instead dispatched Vice President Mike Pence to help Mr Gillespie, although Mr Trump promised Gillespie would "make America great again" in a recorded phone message that went to voters on the election's final day. Mr Gillespie, a former aide to ex-president George W Bush and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, largely reinvented himself as election day neared by adopting many of Mr Trump's racially-tinged nationalist positions. Mr Gillespie warned of the dangers of the Hispanic street gang, MS-13, and highlighted its motto, "Kill, Rape, Control", in a television ad. The New Jersey native also vowed to protect Confederate monuments, and condemned the national anthem protests by NFL players. In the days before the election, former Trump chief strategist Steve Bannon said Mr Gillespie's embrace of "Trumpism" offered a roadmap for other Republican candidates nationwide heading into the 2018 mid-term elections. Mr Bannon did not respond to a request for comment late on Tuesday. In New Jersey, Democrat Phil Murphy trounced Republican Lt Gov Kim Guadagno, who served under the term-limited, deeply unpopular Republican governor Chris Christie. New Jersey Democratic senator Cory Booker, who is one of several Democrats weighing up a possible presidential bid in 2020, cast his party's gubernatorial victories in New Jersey and Virginia as "the very first state-wide rebuttal of the Trump administration". And he declared: "We will not succumb to the politics of fear." The day also exposed deepening regional divisions between America's two major political parties. Democrats picked up one state Senate seat in Washington state, which flipped control of the state legislature from Republicans to Democrats. In so doing, Democrats now control every governor's office and state legislature on the West Coast. While Democrats also control a cluster of state governments in the North-east, Republicans, however, control state legislatures across the entire South, all but one state in the Midwest and the vast majority of the mountain West. Excited Democrats hope to flip control of several state houses next year just as state leaders prepare for the once-in-a-decade task of resetting congressional boundaries, a process known as redistricting. AP First Wai Wai noodle bar opens in Lalitpur CG Corp opened its first Wai Wai noodle bar at Labim Mall, Lalitpur on Monday to raise awareness about the iconic brand. The company is looking forward to the noodle bar being the favourite place for people to gather and enjoy their favourite snack, reads a press release. Egypt's highest appeals court has upheld a five-year prison sentence for Alaa Abdel-Fattah, a senior figure within the country's pro-democracy movement convicted for taking part in a peaceful demonstration in 2013. Judge Hani Mustafa upheld a prior verdict by a criminal court that ruled Abdel-Fattah had protested illegally, endangered the public interest, and stole a police radio. Street protests have been effectively banned in Egypt. Abdel-Fattah's aunt Ahdaf Soueif, a novelist and rights advocate, lamented the decision. She said: "I'm sorry. Our hearts are with everyone who's been following us and rooting for Alaa and justice. We stay together." Abdel-Fattah has around 18 months remaining of his sentence. He also faces another sentencing in December over accusations he insulted the judiciary. President Donald Trump sits in his presidential limo as poor weather stopped him visiting the demilitarised zone on his trip to South Korea (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik) President Donald Trump has delivered a sharp warning to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, telling him the weapons he is acquiring "are not making you safer. They are putting your regime in grave danger." In a speech delivered hours after he aborted a visit to the heavily fortified Korean demilitarised zone due to bad weather, Mr Trump called on all nations to join forces "to isolate the brutal regime of North Korea - to deny it any form of support, supply, or acceptance". "Today, I hope I speak not only for our countries, but for all civilised nations, when I say to the North: Do not underestimate us. And do not try us. "We will defend our common security, our shared prosperity, and our sacred liberty," he told South Korean lawmakers. Mr Trump had been scheduled to make the unannounced early morning trip to the demilitarised zone - or DMZ - amid heightened tensions with North Korea over its nuclear program. The Marine One presidential helicopter left Seoul at daybreak and flew most of the way to the DMZ but was forced to turn back just five minutes out due to poor weather conditions. Reporters travelling in a separate helicopter as part of the president's envoy saw fog through the windows, and weather reports from near the heavily fortified border showed misting conditions and visibility below one mile. Pilots, officials said, could not see the other helicopters in the air. White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the president was disappointed he couldn't make the trip. "I think he's pretty frustrated," she told reporters. "It was obviously something he wanted to do." Before he left for Asia, a White House official had ruled out a DMZ visit for Mr Trump, claiming the president didn't have time on his schedule and that DMZ visits have become a little cliche. But Ms Sanders said the visit had been planned well before Trump's departure for Asia. The trip was kept secret for security reasons, she said. Mr Trump had been scheduled to make the visit with South Korean President Moon Jae-in, who travelled separately and landed about a 20-minute drive from the DMZ. Ms Sanders said the military and the US Secret Service had deemed that landing would not be safe, and Mr Trump deferred to them. After returning to Seoul, administration officials had hoped they might be able to wait out the bad weather and make a second landing attempt. At the US Army's Yongsan Garrison landing zone, White House Chief of Staff John Kelly and Ms Sanders frequently glanced up at the clouds to see if the sky was clearing. But time would not allow it. The aborted visit came hours before Mr Trump addressed the South Korean National Assembly before closing out his two-day visit to the nation and heading to his next stop, Beijing. Visiting the border that has separated the North and South for 64 years has become something of a ritual for US presidents trying to demonstrate their resolve against North Korea's ever-escalating aggression. Every American president since Ronald Reagan, save for George HW Bush, has made the trip, peering across the barren north through binoculars, hearing broadcast propaganda and reaffirming their commitment to standing with the South. (AP) What do Gerry Adams and professional provocateuse Katie Hopkins have in common? More than you might imagine. Both of them have a new book out this month. Both are famous for violently dividing public opinion. Both are more used than most of us to being interviewed under caution by the police. Now it turns out the pair also share a belief in the inevitability of a united Ireland. At least, that's what Katie Hopkins has been telling interviewers while promoting her memoir, Rude. The Sinn Fein leader must be mortified to find himself singing from the same hymn-sheet as someone who once described migrants as "cockroaches". Politics does make some strange bedfellows. What's even more surprising is that Katie Hopkins still claims to broadly support the DUP, whose entire reason for existence is to stop a united Ireland from coming about. Nor is this the only subject on which she disagrees with that party's more traditional supporters. Hopkins is also firmly pro-choice when it comes to abortion, as well as taking huge pride in being, in her own words, a "gay icon" - not a thing that can safely be said about your average Democratic Unionist. Is she wrong about a united Ireland, though? Even suggesting that Katie Hopkins may be right about something is regarded as disgraceful in certain quarters. She didn't become the Most Hated Woman in Britain by packaging her opinions for widespread approval. Unionists will be fervently hoping she's wrong about this, too. The good news for them is that she is wrong - but only insofar as saying a united Ireland is "inevitable". That's going too far. Nothing in life is certain except death and taxes, as Benjamin Franklin famously said. But a united Ireland is undoubtedly plausible at some point in the foreseeable future. British politics is in flux right now. All bets are off. It's easy to sketch a scenario in which Brexit leads to the break-up of the United Kingdom; and if Scotland goes, how long can Northern Ireland realistically cling on? Nationalists, on both sides of the North Channel, only have to get lucky once. The law of probability suggests that they'll manage it one day and it would, indeed, be the ultimate irony if a united Ireland came about directly because of a rise in British, rather than Irish, nationalism. There are other factors at play, too. Historically, unionism has always been a defensive philosophy by definition, forced to hold out like a city under siege, assailed by enemies without and a growing faction inside the walls, which is not sympathetic to their cause. Such situations rarely end well for the defenders within. True, the numbers are hard to interpret. Despite a narrowing gap between Protestants and Catholics, polls consistently show that the number of people who want a united Ireland right now is comparatively small compared to those who long for it as a distant aspiration, or who don't want it at all; but that doesn't mean those people wouldn't vote for reunification if given a chance. After all, they might not get another one for a while. That's why unionism should be wooing those who see themselves as Irish, rather than alienating them in a short-sighted bid to shore up a tribal base that's solidly behind the Union anyway. By not making a persuasive case for staying in the UK, unionists sometimes give the impression that they think a united Ireland is inevitable, too, and are simply trying to hold off the dreaded day for as long as possible. That only makes it more likely to happen. What happens then, nobody knows. All hell breaks loose for a while, probably. As for what a united Ireland looks like when the dust clears, that's similarly mysterious. Possibly, some kind of federal settlement, with largely self-governing regions, might be one solution. Sinn Fein flirted with that idea decades ago in a policy known as "Eire Nua", before immediately rejecting it as heresy, presumably on the grounds that it actually made imaginative allowances for Ulster's separate identity, rather than pretending that centuries of history can be wished away by the creation of a Celtic fairyland. The point is that anyone who says constitutional arrangements are fixed in stone is ignoring the lessons of history. No specific outcome is inevitable, but change is. All that ever remains to be determined is what sort of change it is. That in turn will shift over time, too. Nothing lasts forever. The Act of Union between England and Scotland has only been in existence since 1707 and might not have happened at all if the Scots hadn't bankrupted themselves by recklessly trying to become a colonial power. (Some say they've been unable to pay their own way ever since.) This is the blink of an eye in historical terms. England itself could break up after Brexit. Restless regions might go "full Catalonia" and demand their independence - or perhaps London, not wanting to cut itself off from European money markets, which make the capital so rich, will assert its rights as a new city state, like Venice of old. It's a brave and foolish historian who'd dare to make predictions. Ireland, likewise, is bound to go through countless metamorphoses over time. Who knows what they'll be? More to the point, who cares? The future is for the people of the future to figure out. Let them lie awake at night worrying about it. We have enough troubles (no pun intended) of our own. It's obsessing over issues such as when and how a united Ireland will come about, or how it can be thwarted, which stops politicians from getting on with the duller, but more important, day-to-day business of government. Katie Hopkins should be commended for managing to annoy almost every one of them with a single statement: nationalists, by saying she supports the DUP; unionists, by declaring that Irish unity is inevitable. One can only imagine that this would please her greatly. Some of her wilder opinions are difficult to defend, not least her view after the Manchester Arena attack that the problem of Islamist terrorism needs a "final solution". That's not a phrase which should readily trip off any reasonable person's tongue since its adoption by the Nazis. But there's something refreshing about her refusal to give a damn what the perennially affronted think about her, especially in this touchy-feely age when everybody wants to be liked. We're all so desperate not to give offence that we spend half our lives these days apologising for having the audacity to express opinions at all. It's almost a year since the RHI scheme began making headlines, but on the streets it no longer seems to be a burning issue. An Irish Language Act and a host of other matters may dominate our political agenda today but cash-for-ash arguably remains more important than them all. It goes right to the heart of decision-making under devolution. If corruption or serial gross incompetence is revealed by the RHI inquiry, then it will have massive implications for the public's already crumbling faith in the entire Stormont system. With a potential overspend of 700m, this disastrous energy scheme affects us all. There should be no sectarian squabbling over the disgrace that is cash-for-ash. As the inquiry opened yesterday, public expectation was mixed with cynicism that it would be yet another lengthy exercise which will cost a lot but find no-one, or certainly no-one of any importance, culpable. There were certainly no fireworks during the first public session in Parliament Buildings. It was all rather mundane and much of the inquiry's business will be turgid stuff. But make no mistake about it, drama lies ahead. The key appearances will be by former DUP minister Jonathan Bell and party leader Arlene Foster. Mr Bell's explosive TV interview with the BBC's Stephen Nolan was referred to yesterday. "What has been revealed to date is only the tip of the iceberg. There is much, much more to come," he said earlier this year. With the hearings broadcast, the public will be able to watch Mr Bell and Mrs Foster give evidence under oath and make up their own mind on their credibility as witnesses. Five former DUP special advisers will also be put under the spotlight, and two could be potentially the most significant witnesses. The DUP is the only party for which the RHI inquiry could prove damaging. There may be minor questions over Michelle O'Neill's promotion of the energy scheme as agriculture minister, but these are small beer compared to the scrutiny facing the DUP. The key issues are the delay in introducing cost controls and the spike in applications. Retired judge Sir Patrick Coghlin, who is chairing the inquiry, is described in legal circles as "straightforward to deal with" and "brusque, old-fashioned, independent and fair". He was active as a rugby player until relatively recently. The aggression, agility and willingness to tackle fearlessly demanded of him on the field will certainly be needed at the RHI inquiry over the coming months. 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. Mit den gewonnenen Informationen mochten wir verstehen, wie unsere Dienste verwendet werden, und die Qualitat dieser Dienste verbessern. neue Dienste zu entwickeln und zu verbessern Werbung auszuliefern und ihre Wirkung zu messen personalisierte Inhalte anzuzeigen, abhangig von Ihren Einstellungen personalisierte Werbung anzuzeigen, abhangig von Ihren Einstellungen Wenn Sie Alle ablehnen auswahlen, verwenden wir Cookies nicht fur diese zusatzlichen Zwecke. 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The new recommendations aim to help preserve the effectiveness of antibiotics that are important for human medicine by reducing their unnecessary use in animals WHO has recommended the farmers and the food industry to stop using antibiotics routinely in order to promote growth and prevent disease in healthy animals. WHO is recommending that farmers and the food industry stop using antibiotics routinely to promote growth and prevent disease in healthy animals. The new recommendations aim to help preserve the effectiveness of antibiotics that are important for human medicine by reducing their unnecessary use in animals. Over-use and misuse of antibiotics in animals and humans is contributing to the rising threat of antibiotic resistance. Some types of bacteria that cause serious infections in humans have already developed resistance to most or all of the available treatments, and there are very few promising options in the research pipeline. Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of WHO said, A lack of effective antibiotics is as serious a security threat as a sudden and deadly disease outbreak. Strong, sustained action across all sectors is vital if we are to turn back the tide of antimicrobial resistance and keep the world safe." WHO strongly recommends an overall reduction in the use of all classes of medically important antibiotics in food-producing animals, including complete restriction of these antibiotics for growth promotion and disease prevention without diagnosis. Healthy animals should only receive antibiotics to prevent disease if it has been diagnosed in other animals in the same flock, herd, or fish population. Where possible, sick animals should be tested to determine the most effective and prudent antibiotic to treat their specific infection. Antibiotics used in animals should be selected from those WHO has listed as being least important to human health, and not from those classified as highest priority critically important. These antibiotics are often the last line, or one of limited treatments, available to treat serious bacterial infections in humans. Dr Kazuaki Miyagishima, Director of the Department of Food Safety and Zoonoses at WHO said, "Scientific evidence demonstrates that overuse of antibiotics in animals can contribute to the emergence of antibiotic resistance. The volume of antibiotics used in animals is continuing to increase worldwide, driven by a growing demand for foods of animal origin, often produced through intensive animal husbandry. Many countries have already taken action to reduce the use of antibiotics in food-producing animals. For example, since 2006, the European Union has banned the use of antibiotics for growth promotion. Consumers are also driving the demand for meat raised without routine use of antibiotics, with some major food chains adopting antibiotic-free policies for their meat supplies. Alternative options to using antibiotics for disease prevention in animals include improving hygiene, better use of vaccination, and changes in animal housing and husbandry practices. Queen Mathilde, The Charismatic Belgium Royalty Looked Magnificent In Anita Dongre Bollywood Wardrobe Dona Queen Mathilde, the honourable royalty of Belgium recently visited India and she looked gorgeous in the Indian traditional ensemble which she carried during her visit to the Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi. The European Queen was wearing a super modish Anarkali dress by Anita Dongre. The blue coloured suit made Her Highness look even more magnificent. The beautiful printed dress from Anita Dongre's 2017 Tree of Love collection looked glorified as the European Royalty's ensemble. The way she carried the traditionally crafted attire portrayed her grace and charisma. "Queen Mathilde wears the tree of life dress elegantly, as always. I look forward to meeting her over lunch this Friday and discuss common interest issues such as women's empowerment and sustainability. I admire her philanthropic work immensely." quoted the designer. Following her was the beautiful actress and MLA Kirron Kher whose style book also caught our attention. She was wearing a beautiful sari with cream, magenta, orange and red colours on the body. Govt employees warn of agitation if not given voting rights The civil servants have warned of agitation if they are prevented from voting in the upcoming elections to the House of Representatives and State Assemblies slated for coming November 26 and December 7. VetsInTech Booz Allen is supporting some of the most urgent technical modernizations happening in the federal government. We need veterans and military spouses with a deep understanding of our defense and intelligence clients missions and the technical expertise to support those modernization efforts. Thats why we partner with VetsInTech which connects veterans and spouses to the technology ecosystem and provides the training, networking, and resources needed to upskill into a career in tech via their VetsInTech Academy. Japanese entrepreneurs arrive in Nepal A 12-member team of the Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Singapore (JCCIS) arrived in Kathmandu on Monday to asses the investment climate in Nepal and discuss areas of cooperation. Left alliance commits to stability, prosperity Former prime ministers KP Sharma Oli and Pushpa Kamal Dahal unveiled on Tuesday the joint manifesto of their parties CPN-UML and CPN (Maoist Centre) that have forged an electoral alliance, expressing their firm commitment to political stability as a precursor to economic prosperity. Left alliance unveils highly ambitious economic agendas Nepals left alliance on Tuesday formally launched its manifesto for upcoming provincial and federal elections, incorporating highly ambitious economic agendas, such as transforming Nepal into a developed country in the next 25 years, Virgin Australia's board has revealed it has been considering mopping up the minority shareholders on its register and making the airline a private company. The company's chair Elizabeth Bryan said on Wednesday that the board had discussed privatising the company, but that there was "no outcome to report to the market at this stage". Only 10 per cent of Virgin's stock is in free float. International carriers Etihad Airways, Singapore Airlines, HNA Aviation Group and Nanshan each own about 20 per cent of Virgin Australia, while Richard Branson's Virgin Group owns another 10 per cent. That leaves less than 10 per cent of the company's shares traded freely on the stockmarket, which has led to speculation Virgin could buy back these remaining shares - worth about $175 million at the current share price - and take the company private. Ros Pesman did not expect she would be one of the lucky few who survived pancreatic cancer when she was diagnosed in 2010. "And it is luck," said Emeritus Professor Pesman (AM). "The odds were extraordinary." Historian Professor Ros Pesman is among the 7% of pancreatic cancer patients who are still alive more than five years after diagnosis. Credit:James Brickwood The esteemed Australian historian is among the 7 per cent of patients with pancreatic cancer who are still alive more than five years after diagnosis. But "luck" is the name we give things we don't yet understand, Professor Pesman, 79, said. Calvary Public Hospital Bruce is unsure how internal documents detailing the requisition of drugs of dependence ended up on a Barton street. The hospital said while it is investigating the issue further, it believes it's an isolated occurrence and not part of a bigger problem. The hospital is investigating how the documents ended up on the street. Credit:Melissa Adams The three documents, provided to The Canberra Times, were found by a member of the public near Brisbane Avenue on the ground. They detail drug orders for two different wards between December 2 and 3 in 2003 and appear to have previously been filed at the hospital. Canberra's Catholic Education Office will aim to be more equitable and transparent in its resource allocation following a stand-off with the federal government over school funding. The Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn Catholic Education Office's three-year strategic plan has listed "[clarifying] how everyone contributes to the growth and wellbeing of students" as a priority, with actions including ensuring the office's resource allocation and financial management processes are "equitable, robust, compliant, transparent and well understood". The Archdiocese of Canberra and Goulburn's Catholic Education Office has revealed its strategic plan for 2018 to 2020. Credit:Michele Mossop Executive director Ross Fox said the focus on transparency and compliance didn't mean the office's current processes were "in any way deficient". "I think we're entering an environment where the expectations are higher and higher - and I think they should be - and we need then to more carefully allocate our resources and that means trying to be much clearer about where the resources are going and where they're most effective," he said. The relevant emails fall into two categories. The first, and apparently less damaging, contain gossip with fellow institute insiders; for example, referring to the Community and Public Sector Union's description of Lloyd as an "IPA pin-up boy". Lloyd also forwards a copy of a doorstop interview with Labor senator Penny Wong, who takes a swipe at the Abbott government's appointment of Lloyd and Tim Wilson, another former institute director. Presumably, friends at the institute would like to be reassured that it now has the inside track and is getting under Labor's skin. The FOI disclosure was in response to a request for correspondence between the Public Service Commission and the institute, a right-wing think tank. It contains several email exchanges between Lloyd and institute members. Lloyd is a former director at the institute, where he remains a member and is obviously on friendly terms with many of its staff. Emails between Public Service Commissioner John Lloyd and his former colleagues at the Institute of Public Affairs, as revealed under freedom of information law and discussed at a recent Senate estimates hearing, raise important questions of public service ethics. Was Lloyd, as he maintains, just engaging in innocuous banter with friends and providing already-available information in answer to legitimate public inquiry? Or was he, as critics say, in serious breach of his legal and ethical obligations? At the estimates hearing, Lloyd excused these comments as being light-hearted in intent, designed to "relieve the tension" amid constant criticism from the union and others. His claim carries some weight. His former links with the institute are well-known and he naturally connects with old friends. The pressure to keep within the confines of expected Australian Public Service leadership-speak must be unbearable at times. All public servants need to sound off occasionally to trusted friends and family away from the straitjacket of bureaucratic correctness. Lloyd presumably had every expectation that his emails would remain confidential and would not be subject to FOI transparency. In effect, he seeks dispensation for remarks that were made off the record and meant only for close friends. Former Commonwealth ombudsman Allan Asher, who resigned because he helped a Greens senator prepare questions for a Senate hearing. Lloyd apparently helped the IPA prepare a submission for a Senate inquiry. Were the cases similar? Credit:Alex Ellinghausen Fair enough, perhaps, except for the resounding contradiction with the position Lloyd himself and the commission have recently taken over public servants' use of social media. In that policy, public servants can be in breach of the code of conduct for comments on social media that undermine the impartiality or reputation of the government or the APS. This applies to comments made apparently in confidence and even extends to posts made by others. The commission was unwilling to give public servants any leeway for normal expectations of confidentiality, let alone for the desirability of "relieving tension". Moreover, as Lloyd insisted, the policy on social media applies more strictly the higher up one is on the bureaucratic ladder. On these principles, Lloyd should have known that any work-based emails could be disclosed. He should also have considered whether his remarks, coming from someone in his position, would, if disclosed, contravene public service impartiality. Rank-and-file public servants can be forgiven for concluding there's one rule for them and another for the bosses. The second category of emails is more potentially serious and consists of a 12-page document that Lloyd sent to an unnamed contact at the institute. He attached it to a message, saying: "As discussed, I attach a document that highlights some of the more generous agreement provisions applying to APS employees." "Hi John," came the reply, "Thank you for this that is very handy." In almost every election campaign, there's a turning point. It's the day where a leader, or a party, stuffs up and a harsh judgment is made by voters. Often it's the enormous fillip it grants the other party that allows it to ride the crest of a wave to victory. Annastacia Palaszczuk has been forced to defend her partner's role in the Adani loan approval process. Credit:Darren England/AAP Of course there are exceptions, and this poll might be one. But there will be no surprises if, post November 25, Annastacia Palaszczuk's Adani decision is this campaign's turning point. Labor's leader prides herself on her word, on listening to others, and on not being tricky. She says she wants to be judged on those things, along with valuing the regions and doing what she says she will do. And largely over her term of power, she's done that. A backpack sitting under a tree at Mount Coot-tha drew bushwalkers off their walking track, where they discovered skeletal remains. The group had been walking along JC Slaughter Falls, surveying a site for the proposed Mount Coot-tha zipline, about 11am on Wednesday when they made the grim discovery. Regional duty officer Inspector Rob Graham said it could be some time before a cause of death or identity would be confirmed. "It is an area that is known to be frequented by homeless people, and that is certainly one of the lines of inquiry that were following now," he said. Nepal, Bahamas establish diplomatic relations Nepal and the Bahamas established diplomatic relations on Tuesday. The last member of the so-called "Evil 8" group of paedophiles has been found guilty of participating in the sexual abuse of a young Perth girl over a two-year period. Alfred John Impicciatore pleaded not guilty to four counts of sexually penetrating a child. Alfred John Impicciatore, 47, pleaded not guilty to the child abuse charges. Credit:LinkedIn He appeared in the WA District Court on Tuesday afternoon where Judge Mark Herron found him guilty on all charges following a short judge-only trial. Impicciatore will be sentenced at a later date. UPDATE: Police have removed the two men protesting above Foreign Minister Julie Bishop's office. Officers abseiled from the rooftop to take the men from their makeshift hanging tent back to the ground just before midday. The men have been arrested and will be charged with trespass. Police take the men down the side of the building. Credit:Molly Schmidt A pastor and a mental health practitioner had been suspended four storeys above the Subiaco office. Pastor Jarrod McKenna and mental health worker Delroy Bergsma said they were calling on the Australian Government to take immediate action to evacuate around 600 men who remain on Manus Island without supplies to food, water, electricity or sanitation. Among its many other sterile and irrelevant activities, as we await a new prime minister, parliament is examining the "benefits and risks of a bipartisan defence agreement". The futility of this is self-evident. The moment either party sees the briefest glimmer of political gold, they'll rush to trash any pretence of unity. And that's exactly as it should be. Malcolm Turnbull, backed by special forces, announces a new ADF focus on counter-terrorism in July. Credit:Ben Rushton There are two excellent reasons this proposal will never be passed. First, people can't even agree about how the world works. No matter how obvious it may be, for example, that the sun has finally set on the British Empire, the Tony Abbotts of this world still sigh, close their eyes tight and hope very hard that it (or something like it) lingers. Labor's foreign policy chief, Penny Wong, on the other hand, knows Britain closed RAF Butterworth back in 1957 and the Malaysians assumed complete control in 1988. That's a small example, but it touches on something deep: how individuals conceive of the world. Independent senator Jacqui Lambie declared she was Aboriginal in her maiden speech in 2014. But the outspoken Tasmanian senator has been drawn into the citizenship scandal after revealing her father was born in Scotland. In the latest twist in what has been described as "the world's most ridiculous constitutional crisis" which has claimed five senators, as well as Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce Senator Lambie is facing scrutiny over her citizenship status. Senator Lambie strongly denies any claims she may hold dual citizenship as a result of her father's birthplace, saying she has "no concerns" about her citizenship status. Immigration Minister Peter Dutton has dismissed claims by the United Nations that alternative accommodation for refugees on Manus Island is not ready. Almost 600 men have barricaded themselves inside the Papua New Guinea island's mothballed detention centre, a week after it was shut down. They believe it's safer to remain in the compound than risk being attacked by locals at new facilities near the main township of Lorengau. The UN's refugee agency has claimed substantive parts of the alternative accommodation were still not ready. NSW Police have raided the home of colourful former Auburn deputy mayor Salim Mehajer, as the property developer comes under pressure over a string of criminal charges. A spokeswoman for NSW Police confirmed on Wednesday that police were conducting a "planned operation" at premises in south-west Sydney relating to an "ongoing investigation". It is understood the raid relates to a car crash Mr Mehajer allegedly had in Lidcombe on October 16 on the way to an assault trial in Sydney's Downing Centre Local Court. Mr Mehajer, 31, has previously rejected claims he staged the crash to avoid the trial, the first of two assault trials that were expected to be heard in the same week. The problem is that Labor wants to make multibillion-dollar promises with other peoples money. No better case in point is Annastacia Palaszczuks promise to create a billion-dollar-a-year Bruce Highway funding scheme . Premier Annastacia Palasczcuk place a Melbourne Cup bet while on the campaign trail. Credit:Darren England/AAP The consequence is outlandish promises where politicians egos write cheques the government cant cash. Labor is putting up less than one-fifth of the money, and then wants Canberra to fund the rest. Worse still, the Premier didnt even pick up the phone to ask the PM for the money before making the promise on his behalf. This is an act of cynicism that says more about her desperation than anything else. Annastacia Palaszczuk knows that the standard finding mix for highways outside major cities is 50/50, so why would she believe the federal government would agree to such a ridiculous finding mix? Actually, she knows that wont, and thats exactly what she wants. Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk is expected to funnel more than $150 million worth of work to fix Queensland's new generation of commuter trains to a Maryborough firm in one of Labor's marginal seats. Ms Palaszczuk will travel to the Wide Bay region to announce Maryborough firm Downer will get the work if Labor wins a second term on November 25. Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk's roadshow rolls into the Wide Bay. Credit:AAP Federal Labor leader Bill Shorten is expected to join the Premier on the campaign trail, with Ms Palaszczuk also expected to make an announcement aimed at shoring up domestic gas supplies. Labor's Bruce Saunders holds the seat of Maryborough with a 1.1 per cent margin. Queensland Opposition Leader Tim Nicholls has denounced LNP colleague Matt Canavan's language after the federal resources minister said a "domestic" between Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk and her "boyfriend" had scuppered a $1 billion loan to Adani. Last Friday, Ms Palaszczuk accused the LNP of a "smear" campaign against her and her partner Shaun Drabsch, who worked at PricewaterhouseCoopers as part of a team on Adani's application to the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility for a loan for its rail link. Senator Matt Canavan described the Premier's decision to veto Adani's NAIF loan as a domestic. Credit:AAP Image/ Mick Tsikas She then announced a veto on the potential for an Adani NAIF loan, which she said was to remove doubt of any perception of a conflict of interest. In Mackay, Senator Canavan referred to Mr Drabsch as Ms Palaszczuk's boyfriend and said: "It took me a while to believe it that a domestic could cost us thousands of jobs in regional Queensland." Cash-for-access meetings with Queensland ministers is unlikely to be on the chopping block any time soon. After revealing she did not like participating in the "pay per view" party-organised events, and limited the number she performed, Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk did not commit to follow the lead of former Labor premier Anna Bligh and ban them altogether. Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk is seen standing next to the media bus. Credit:AAP Image/ Darren England Ms Palaszczuk said political parties needed to raise money. "In a perfect world, that wouldn't happen but then taxpayers would have to pay [for political parties' election campaigns]," she said. Pistol found on bike used by MC candidate Police on Tuesday found a pistol and three bullets on a motorcycle being used by a CPN (Maoist Centre) candidate for the upcoming elections in Bhimsen Rural Municipality-3. Screen and size aside the two phones are practically identical. The XL has a larger battery, but it also powers a bigger screen, and I found either phone easily made it through a day of heavy use without a charge. With Snapdragon 835 chips and 4GB of RAM under the hood general navigation is buttery smooth, demanding apps and graphics-heavy games are no issue, and unlike most modern phones they don't really heat up under pressure. The lack of an microSD card slot still hurts, with the phones limited to their 64GB or 128GB internal storage. Camera The camera was a big focus of the original Pixel and that continues here, with the 12.2MP, f/1.8 main shooter receiving the highest ever rating for a smartphone camera from DxOMark. Characteristically for Google, it's all about the software. There is no "manual" mode here, beyond options to override automatic colour temperature and exposure levels if you want to, and that's fine as the camera software knows how to take the best picture basically every time. Google's HDR+ algorithm is constantly on (and you have to look through a lot of menus to turn it off), producing detailed, beautifully coloured shots in all lighting conditions. You can manually focus by tapping if you like, but the autofocus hasn't let me down yet. Following Apple's lead, Google has also introduced "Motion Photos" and a portrait mode. By default, motion photos are captured when you're shooting something that moves a lot, and the result is a few seconds of video you can turn into a GIF for sharing. I found this most handy for children, pets and spontaneous shots of friends, where a still image sometimes doesn't do the energy of the scene justice. Of course you can also opt to just view these as regular photos and ignore the motion. Portrait mode works a little differently on Pixel 2 than other phones, using some impressive software to blur backgrounds and produce a bokeh effect, rather than needing a second lens. The results can be amazing, through either the primary shooter or the 8MP selfie cam, with clear faces, soft blur on closer background objects and heavy blur further back. But it's not flawless. Whispy hair and things like earphone cables often get blurred out, while weird background artefacts can happen if you're not close enough to the subject. A standard image is always saved alongside the processed one though, so you can't ruin a shot. On the video side, you can do 4K at 30fps or 1080p at 60fps, up to 120fps if you want slow motion. Drop the resolution to 720p and you can get 240fps super slow mo. It all works without a hitch. Software Besides imaging, Google's version of Android 8.0 Oreo is absolutely the highlight of the Pixel 2 phones. The home screen encourages you to keep app clutter to a minimum with an "at a glance" widget up the top that shows the date but will dynamically update to display your upcoming calendar events, and a Google Search bar down below that you can ask for whatever you need, be it an app, information from the internet or an album you'd like to play. If you don't feel like typing, you can just squeeze the edges of the phone to bring up Google Assistant, and say your query out loud. If your phone's out of reach, "Ok Google" still works. Swiping right still gets you access to Google Now cards, and swiping up gets you your app drawer. Purists can ignore all of Google's smarts and just fill home screens with app icons and widgets if they prefer. Tapping and holding an app's icon to get shortcuts and suggestions works better than ever now, and can be a real time saver once you get used to it. Being Android you can of course use whatever apps you like for any of the phone's functions, but Google's own offerings are here by default and more or less how they always have been. Photos now keeps all your Motion Photos and Portrait images in order even when they're backed up to the cloud, and also introduces a new feature called Google Lens. Like a mix between Now on Tap and Reverse Google Image Search, Lens scans a photo to deliver information from Google's insanely big knowledge bank. Photograph a book or a restaurant and it will pull up reviews. Snap a sign in a foreign language and it will translate. It's clearly early, but it's very impressive. Google's implementation of an always-on screen is perhaps my favourite take on the idea so far. It's often minimal, just showing the date, time, alarms and app icons for unread notifications, but it can also update to show full text of new messages, details of Now cards like travel times and traffic conditions, and even the names of songs it hears playing around you. More than any other phone, I feel I can leave it face up near me at work and get most of what I need by just glancing at it every now and then. Virginia's most socially conservative state lawmaker was ousted from office on Tuesday by Danica Roem, a Democrat who is poised to become the nation's first openly transgender state lawmaker and embodies much of what her opponent Robert G. Marshall fought against. The election race focused on traffic and other local issues in suburban Prince William County but also exposed the nation's fault lines over gender identity. It pitted a 33-year-old former journalist, who began her physical gender transition four years ago, against a man who had held the post for a quarter of a century, who called himself Virginia's "chief homophobe" and earlier this year introduced a "bathroom bill" that died in committee. "Discrimination is a disqualifier," a jubilant Roem said on Tuesday night as her margin of victory became clear. "This is about the people of the 13th District disregarding fear tactics, disregarding phobias... where we celebrate you because of who you are, not despite it." Marshall, 73, who refused to debate Roem and referred to her throughout the campaign using male pronouns, declined an interview request but posted a concession message on Facebook. As Donald Trump prepared for his five-nation Asia tour the longest undertaken by any American leader since 1991 many regional observers were understandably nervous. The President's early diplomatic efforts are now best remembered for his odd habit of arm-wrestling world leaders as they sought to shake his hand. Upon winning government the Trump administration's first key signal to its friends and allies across Asia was to dump the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which most considered to be a vital strategic and economic response to China's growing regional authority. US President Donald Trump and South Korean President Moon Jae-in, right, have lunch with US and South Korean troops at Camp Humphreys in Pyeongtaek, South Korea on Tuesday. Credit:AP Since then the President has appeared unduly fixated on bilateral trade relationships and his sense that the US should somehow be "winning" them. His rhetoric and positioning on the region has been at times incoherent, at times dangerously inflammatory. His threats to rain "fire and fury" upon North Korea only heightened the sense that the horrifying spectre of nuclear war was closer than it had been in a generation. Meanwhile North Korea's dictator Kim Jong-un demonstrated a consistent determination to continue his nuclear development program, marking off technological advances with a rapidity that stunned international observers. Beirut: Lebanon is used to affronts to its sovereignty. Israel occupied part of the country for years. Syrian troops stayed even longer. Then the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah fought a war with Israel, and waged another in Syria, as the Lebanese government watched. The United States, France and Britain have, over the past century, done their share of meddling. But no one has seen anything quite like the spectacle that has played out over the past few days. Prime Minister Saad Hariri, who had previously shown no signs of planning to quit, unexpectedly flew to Saudi Arabia and announced his resignation from there, to the shock of his own close advisers. He has not been back since, and no one is sure when, or if, he is returning. Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri in more transparent times. Credit:AP Hours after Hariri's pre-recorded announcement - televised on a Saudi-controlled channel on Saturday - Saudi Arabia's assertive new crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, presided over the round-up of some 500 people, including 11 princes, on corruption charges. Lebanon broke out the popcorn. Voters have delivered their first forceful rebuke of President Donald Trump, with the Demoratic Party capturing governorships in two key states and making significant inroads into suburban communities that once favoured the Republican Party. The Democrats crowning success on Tuesday night came in Virginia, where Lieutenant Governor Ralph S. Northam, an understated physician and Army veteran, won a commanding victory for governor, overcoming a racially charged campaign by his Republican opponent and cementing Virginia's transformation into a reliably Democratic state largely immune to Trump-style appeals. Mr Northam was propelled to victory over Ed Gillespie, the Republican nominee, by liberal and moderate voters who were eager to send a message to Trump in a state that rejected him in 2016. Mr Northam led Mr Gillespie by nearly nine percentage points, the widest victory in decades for a Democratic candidate for governor of Virginia. His dominating performance offered a momentary catharsis for Democrats beyond the state's borders and represented a stern warning to Republicans on the ballot next year about the peril of embracing President Trump's approach. Sign up for our amNY Sports email newsletter to get insights and game coverage for your favorite teams This musical is anything but basic. A Bergen Beach playwright will make a splash this month with a frothy new musical comedy opening on Nov. 17 at Hunters Steak and Ale House in Bay Ridge. Pumpkin Spiced Musical tells the story of an advertising agency that embraces the commercial craze surrounding the flavor of fall by inventing a unique pumpkin spiceflavored mystery product. The show was inspired by the annual autumnal obsession with squash spices, which has hit an all-time high this year, said the playwright. I love pumpkin spice lattes, I love Starbucks, no doubt about it, said Ben Stiefel, who plays piano at Hunters every Friday night. But to have air fresheners and cereals and candies its all just gone totally nuts. This fall, its everywhere you look, once you start recognizing it. Stiefel, who insisted that he only drinks the flavored Starbucks lattes once or twice a week, said that he has nothing against consumers of the pumpkin-flavored products, but he wanted to poke fun at the advertisers, marketers, and executives who shamelessly hawk the goods. Its just endlessly silly the way companies are trying to profit off of this pumpkin spice craze, and I thought it would be a really cool way to satirize it. It was more my intention to satirize that than the people who might enjoy this stuff, he said. He was particularly aghast when he recently saw pumpkin spice dog treats at Petco. My first thought was, maybe theres a new audience for my show, these dogs that love pumpkin spice, he added. The show features four local actors James Parks, Sofie W. Smith, Natalie Perry, and Peter Anthony Moore with Stiefel accompanying on the piano. Before and after the roughly 90-minute show, audience members can indulge in a variety of custom pumpkin drinks from the Hunters menu, including pumpkin-spiced espresso martinis and apple cinnamon sangria. Stiefel refused to reveal what pumpkin-flavored product the advertising agency creates in his musical, but promised that the audience will be as shocked as he was at Petco. I think its a big moment, he said. My hope is that its surprising and funny in a big way. Pumpkin Spiced Musical at Hunters Steak and Ale House (9404 Fourth Ave. between 94th and 95th streets in Bay Ridge, www.hunte rsste akhou se.com ). Nov. 17 at 6 pm; Nov. 18 at 4 pm; Nov. 19 at 2 pm. $20. Reach reporter Julianne McShane at (718) 2602523 or by e-mail at jmcsh ane@c ngloc al.com . Follow her on Twitter @juliannemcshane. Irelands foodservice market continues to grow and is now valued at a record 7.8billion, comprising over 33,000 individual outlets. This is according to a 2017 Irish Foodservice Channel Insights Report from Bord Bia which is being released in advance of its annual foodservice seminar which takes place in the Aviva Stadium, Dublin. The foodservice market includes all food consumed out of home incorporating restaurants, pubs, hotels, coffee shops, workplace catering, hospitals, education and vending. The report, which also tracks consumer behaviour and sentiment when eating away from home, highlights that take away, or grab-and-go concepts, are one of the key drivers of foodservice growth and that healthier foods are trending and influencing menu ideation. Over one third (35%) of consumer spend is found in Limited Service Restaurants, which incorporates quick-service restaurants, fast-casual dining and food-to-go, with 12% attributed to Full Service Restaurants. Consumer spending in pubs (excluding alcohol) accounts for 17% of the market value and is showing a lower year on year growth rate than the overall market attributed in part to Brexit which has decreased weekend trips and holiday visits to Ireland by UK travellers. The two segments showing the biggest share gain are the hotel segment, accounting for 17% of total foodservice consumer spending and the coffee shops and cafes which now account for 6%. The investment in beverage has been seen across all segments as operators strive to provide High Street level coffee and beverage programmes to their guests. Flat whites are this years trending coffee beverage with coffee perceived as an affordable luxury among consumers and health trends are beginning to shape coffee orders with consumers seeking out alternative milks. The report finds a rise in fast-casual concepts (limited service but generally more upscale offering higher quality ingredients and higher average spend than quick-service) to meet the consumer demand for higher-quality foods at an affordable price. The findings of the report will be shared with more than 300 delegates at Bord Bias Foodservice Seminar taking place in the Aviva Stadium, Dublin today. The annual event which discusses emerging trends in the sector will be chaired by entrepreneur and business-man, Bobby Kerr. Source: www.businessworld.ie It was announced yesterday that MetLife has officially opened a new Global Technology Campus in Galway. Yesterdays celebration saw MetLife joined by the Tanaiste and Minister for Business, Enterprise and Innovation, Frances Fitzgerald TD; Michael DArcy, Minister of State with Responsibility for Financial Services & Insurance and other dignitaries. MetLife executive leaders from around the world were also present. Metlife has plans to employ approximately 200 skilled IT professionals when at full capacity. Including its existing office in Dublin, MetLifes presence in Ireland will grow to more than 500 employees once recruitment at the new Global Technology Campus is complete. Since its founding through the end of 2014, MetLife Foundation has provided more than $670 million in grants and $70 million in program-related investments globally to organizations addressing issues that have a positive impact in their communities. Today, the Foundation is dedicated to advancing financial inclusion, committing $200 million to help build a secure future for individuals and communities around the world. Speaking at the office opening, President of MetLife US and EMEA, Michel Khalaf said, "MetLifes new Global Technology Campus builds on our significant presence in Ireland which is the hub of our European insurance businesses. Just as we have done in Dublin, we look forward to growing our workforce here in Galway in the coming years and contributing fully to the local community. Today is confirmation of our strong and successful link with Ireland and represents a vote of confidence in that relationship into the future." An Tanaiste and Minister for Business, Enterprise and Innovation, Frances Fitzgerald added, "This is an extremely exciting project, and the Irish Government is very pleased that our ongoing work in driving competitiveness and providing quality skills is paying dividends in attracting cutting-edge projects like this. This development will see a further 200 people employed in Ireland and we look forward to our continued fruitful relationship with MetLife in both its Galway and Dublin operations, well into the future." Source: www.businessworld.ie RPP firm on Hindu state, monarchy The Rastriya Prajatantra Party led by Kamal Thapa has said it is firm on its demand for Hindu state and constitutional monarchy while also accepting the Constitution of Nepal in the new political set-up. The party has said democracy and constitutional monarchy can go together, which is the only way to maintain stability in the country. The European Commissioner for Competition Policy, Margrethe Vestager, has signalled that repurposing NAMA to deliver social housing is possible in the context of EU state aid rules. Ms. Vestager recently sent a letter Brian Hayes MEP in relation to the issue of NAMA being used for social housing purposes. According to Mr Hayes, Commissioner Vestager has effectively given a positive signal that NAMA can be repurposed to deliver social housing without breaching state aid rules. The MEP believes this is good news for Ireland and good news for Ireland's housing needs. Given that NAMAs establishment in 2010 has to be approved by the Commission under state aid rules, Ireland will need to get more clarity from the Commission about what is feasible in the repurposing of NAMA. More broadly, it is a question that many actors all over the EU will have about how much government intervention there can be when it comes to social housing and compliance with state aid rules. Speaking this week, Brian Hayes MEP said, "The key benchmark is the Commission's Decision from 2012 relating to state aid rules in the context of services for general economic interest. We must make sure that any move to repurpose NAMA satisfies all the criteria outlined in this decision. The rules are not over-complicated; they focus on things like transparency, regular reporting and ensuring that any form of aid provided to an agency does not excessively affect competition in the housing sector." He added, "Clearly the provision of social housing is of vital national interest and there should be scope for state agencies to use their remit to deliver on the social housing front. The important thing is that the market does not become distorted through government intervention." Source: www.businessworld.ie The winners of the Social Innovation Fund Ireland (SIFI)s Education Fund were announced yesterday. Worth 7 million, the fund is one of the most significant investments of private philanthropy in programmes that tackle educational disadvantage. The Education Fund is the largest SIFI fund to date and is made up of 50% private philanthropic funding, self-raised by the awardees. The other half comes from Government, through the Department of Rural and Community Development via the Dormant Accounts Fund. The Education Fund has identified the best in class innovative education programmes that serve as models of excellence in overcoming inequalities in education with a long-term positive impact on their young and adult learners, their families and communities. As part of the application for this fund, projects applied with philanthropic funding secured by them, to be matched by SIFI, to provide an uplift on the projects funds. This approach to funding is a celebration of the power of collaboration between private and public sectors. Each awardee secured funding through a variety of methods including corporate sponsorship, alumni donations and fundraising techniques such as community raffles. The Education Fund match fund encapsulates the idea of smart giving and illustrates the power of a great idea, a passionate leader, savvy donors and government incentives. The 10 awardees, have demonstrated innovation in education service provision that tackles educational disadvantage, and will share the 7 million. The awardees are: Cork Life Centre Trinity Centre for People with Disabilities An Cosan Virtual Community College Partnership between DPS Engineering and UCD Foundation Cork Life Centre Churchfield Community Trust Focus Ireland Fast Track Academy iScoil Speedpak Group - Enhanced Skills Traineeship Speaking yesterday, Minister for Education and Skills Richard Bruton said, "Some of the initiatives that we see here today, show real innovation in tackling some of the challenges we face in education, particularly in the area of breaking down cycles of disadvantage, and will most definitely contribute towards our realisation of this ambition. Furthermore, the Education Fund is a celebration of the power of collaboration between the private and public sectors and its great to see SIFI showing the potential of both to work in partnership together to deliver real results." Source: www.businessworld.ie It was announced today that Ireland has been selected to manage a new 3.6 million EU fellowship programme for international software researchers. ALECS (Advanced Learning in Evolving Critical Systems) will be co-ordinated by UL and Lero, the Irish Software Research Centre. The initiative is being funded by the EC under the Marie Skodowska-Curie programme and by Science Foundation Ireland through Lero. Under the ALECS programme, Ireland will benefit from the influx of 26 international advanced software researchers. The fellowships will be open to overseas PhD degree holders or researchers with at least four years high-level research background. The benefits will be spread across Irish industry as the two year programme will require a 3-6 month secondment to an industry partner. The first call for proposals will be published before end of November and the first researchers are expected to start their fellowship in August 2018. They will be based across seven Irish universities all of which are members of Lero. This project has received funding from the European Unions Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme. Speaking this week, Director of SFI backed Lero, Professor Brian Fitzgerald said, "The ALECS programme reflects the fact that software-based systems are increasingly important to economic activity and to the normal functioning of our everyday lives. The scope, scale and interconnected nature of such systems are increasing rapidly, with the potential consequences of failure, security breaches or malfunction becoming a growing cause of concern." Source: www.businessworld.ie U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to the media during a press conference on Thursday at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. Photo: IC President Xi Jinping will host U.S. President Donald Trump in China for the first time on Wednesday. Trumps visit is part of his whirlwind Asia tour that saw him spend three days in South Korea. Trump will be accompanied by a business delegation that includes the leaders of 28 U.S. companies, including Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein. China is laying out a red-carpet welcome for the Trump. In what Cui Tiankai, Chinas ambassador to the U.S., has called a state visit-plus, Trump will be the first foreign leader in the history of the Peoples Republic of China to be invited to dinner in the Forbidden City. Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said the welcome was a way to reciprocate the considerate reception the U.S. gave Xi earlier this year. We Chinese people believe that courtesy calls for reciprocity, she said. So far, the hashtag Trump in China has been used more than 2 million times on Weibo, Chinas Twitter-like social media platform. During his stay, Trump will tour the Palace Museum, dine with Xi and his wife, Peng Liyuan, and attend a state dinner at the Great Hall of People. He will also attend a series of face-to-face meetings with Xi. What they will talk about is the question on everyones mind. Among the media speculation in the run-up to the visit, several issues have emerged as potential topics of conversation. What issue will top Trumps agenda? Shortly before arriving in Beijing, Trump delivered a blistering speech to South Koreas National Assembly in which he called out China, as well as Russia, as he encouraged world leaders to deny aid to North Korea, Bloomberg reported early Wednesday. The U.S. president called North Korea a hell no person deserves. Specifically, the U.S. wants China to cut off the oil supply to its neighbor. In April 2016, China stopped exporting refined petroleum products like gasoline to North Korea as part the six trade sanctions it slapped on the country. However, China still exports crude oil to North Korea, which Beijing argues is allowed under the U.N. resolution imposing the sanctions. China has also stopped importing North Korean coal and seafood, which are two of the countrys major sources of income. What issues will Trump be advocating for on behalf of U.S. companies? Trump is pushing for more market access for pharmaceutical and insurance companies, as well as for U.S. social media giants like Facebook and Twitter, whose services remain blocked on the Chinese mainland, according to U.S. Ambassador to China Terry Branstad. The Chinese side is expected to discuss U.S. restrictions on Chinese acquisitions of high-tech companies. In September, for example, a U.S. chipmaker, Lattice Semiconductor Corp., announced that was scrapping a $1.3 billion deal to be purchased by a China-backed group that included China Venture Capital Fund Corp. Ltd. Lattice announced the deals demise shortly after the White House released its own statement that Trump was blocking the plan. What about trade? Trump arrived the same day Chinas General Administration of Customs released its monthly trade data. The U.S. president has been critical of China for its long-running trade surplus with the U.S. On Wednesday, China Customs reported a trade surplus of 254.47 billion yuan ($38.35 billion) for October. Its trade surplus with the U.S. came in at $26.6 billion in October, Bloomberg reported. China response is that it is addressing the issue. Cui said it will take time to narrow the trade gap with the U.S. because it is a structural problem, according to a report in the state-run China Daily. He said China doesnt want a huge trade surplus, which could hurt the countrys economy in the long run. If the U.S. could lift some of the restrictions it has on certain exports to China, such as high-tech products for civilian use, it could boost U.S. exports and help achieve more balanced trade between the two countries, Cui said. The U.S. ambassador to China specifically mentioned drugs as one of the issues on the table. Whats the problem? In an interview with Chinese media on Monday, Branstad mentioned one area of particular concern was the drug fentanyl, an extremely powerful opioid painkiller. Trump has accused manufacturers in China of producing the flood of fentanyl behind the opioid addiction crisis in the U.S., according to Reuters. China disputes the allegation. China has been very cooperative with the U.S. on the issue, Branstad said. Still, the U.S. is seeking more help to deal with new derivatives of the drug that keep appearing in China. Branstad called the drug a poison that has killed many people in the U.S. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control has estimated that fentanyl and fentanyl analogues killed more than 20,000 people in the U.S. in 2016. Currently, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and its Chinese counterpart are working to unearth the sources of the drug and shut down the factories that make it. More than two dozen U.S. corporate leaders will accompany Trump on the trip. Does that mean we can expect the two sides will reach some headline-grabbing deals? Branstad said the U.S. anticipates a number of memorandums of understanding to be signed during Trumps visit. The ambassador skimped on the details, saying only that the agreements will be many and varied, with some in the manufacturing and energy industries. One deal that made headlines in the run-up to the trip will allow each country to accept the others certifications for new aircraft. Still, many businesspeople in China have said that reciprocity is still far too lacking in many areas. Whats needed are major structural changes in the way China permits foreign investment through the signing of a long-stalled bilateral investment treaty. Hong Kongs Task Force on Land Supply has endorsed six proposed land reclamation projects that could add as much as 1,490 hectares (5.75 square miles) to the special administrative regions land area by 2030. The proposals include a 1,000-hectare artificial island in the waters between Hong Kong Island and Lantau Island to the southwest, according to a government document published late Tuesday. The recently formed task force part of the citys Development Bureau met Tuesday to discuss the projects, as well as the use of caverns and underground spaces for public infrastructure. The government decided on the six locations after conducting a study from 2011 to 2014 and seeking opinions from the public. A seventh project, off Lantau, previously passed the approval process and will begin construction soon. The approximately 121-hectare Tung Chung East extension will be able to house an estimated 40,800 apartment units, and around 877,000 square meters (9.44 million square feet) of commercial space, according to the document. Hong Kong is located at the mouth of Chinas Pearl River Delta, which in recent years has been dramatically altered by massive reclamation projects on the Chinese mainland. Although about 25% of space-scarce Hong Kongs total developed area consists of reclaimed land, there have been no large-scale reclamation projects since the 2000s, the task force said. Contact reporter Teng Jing Xuan (jingxuanteng@caixin.com) An official employment notification has been released by the All India Institute Of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Jodhpur calling out for interested and eligible candidates to apply for the positions of Professor, Additional Professor, Associate Professor and Assistant Professor in various departments for the recruitment. Vacancy availability Number of posts: 45 Name of the posts: Professor: 13 Additional Professor: 11 Associate Professor: 11 Assistant Professor: 10 Candidates are advised to check for their eligibility criteria before applying for any job. Also, it is good to apply as soon as possible in order to avoid last minute rush. Eligibility Educational qualification: The candidates interested in applying for this post should be holding a medical qualification included in the I or II schedule or part II of the third schedule to the Indian medical council Act of 1956. He/she should be holding a post graduate qualification e.g. MD/MS or a recognised qualification equivalent thereto in the respective discipline/subject. Age criteria Professor/ Additional Professor: The age of the candidates applying for these posts must not exceed 58 years. Associate Professor/ Assistant Professor: The age of the candidates applying for these posts must not exceed 50 years. Also Read: Teachers Recruitment: Apply for Lecturer Posts in Odisha Public Service Commission! Salary details Professor/ Additional Professor/ Professor/ Additional Professor: The selected candidates will be getting a monthly salary of Rs 37,400 to Rs 67,000, along with a grade pay of Rs 10,500. Assistant Professor: The selected candidates will be getting a monthly salary of Rs 15,600 to Rs 39,100, along with a grade pay of Rs 9,000. Selection process The candidates will be selected on the basis of an interview. How to apply for the AIIMS recruitment? The candidates interested in the AIIMS Jodhpur recruitment are required to apply at the official website www.aiimsjodhpur.edu. Note: The Candidate must ensure that their photo and signature should be clearly visible in preview at the time of filling of application in online mode. If photo/signature image is displayed small or not visible in preview on website, that means photo/signature is not as per the AIIMS, Jodhpur prescribed and in that case, your application will be rejected. So, be careful while uploading your photo and signature. Both must be visible clearly on Online Application form. You can find the official advertisement notification here. Deadline The last date for submission of application is December 3. REET 2018: Apply for Rajasthan Teachers Recruitment Now! Touting trade tricks In a globalised world, an individual country has immense opportunities to exploit international markets. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: In Atlanta, Soyia Ellison, soyia.ellison@cartercenter.org In Nairobi, Don Bisson, don.bisson@cartercenter.org NAIROBI In a statement about Kenyas Oct. 26 election released today, The Carter Center urged Kenyas political leaders to engage in constructive dialogue to bridge the gap between the opposition and ruling parties, and their respective supporters, following a tense electoral period. Kenyas fresh presidential election, scheduled following the Supreme Courts annulment of the Aug. 8 race, unfolded in a context of heightened tensions stemming from the protracted electoral process, confrontational tactics and harsh verbal attacks by key political leaders, and outbursts of violence around election day. These problems severely undermined the ability of Kenyas electoral and judicial institutions to implement the fresh presidential elections. Rather than consolidating support for a national political program, the election polarized the country and exposed the deep tribal and ethnic rifts that have longed characterized its politics. Regrettably, the actions of Kenyas political leaders served to weaken its democratic and independent institutions, constrain the ability of citizens to participate in the civic affairs of their country, and damage the nations democratic development. In the days ahead, it is incumbent on political leaders to put personal agendas aside and take steps to heal the country while maintaining the countrys constitutional order. Todays statement provides an initial summary analysis of political and electoral developments between the Aug. 8 elections and the fresh election held on Oct. 26, based on the reporting of the Centers core team of experts and long-term observers who were on the ground for the Oct. 26 poll. We note that the electoral process is not yet complete, as electoral disputes are pending in the Supreme Court. The Carter Center will release a comprehensive statement on the overall election process after its completion. A detailed final report will be published in early 2018. Read the full statement > Background: The Carter Center has had a core team of experts in Kenya since April, monitoring key parts of the electoral process, including voter registration, campaigning, electoral preparations, and the recent resolution of disputes in the courts. That team was joined by a large group of observers who helped monitor voting, counting, and tallying in the days surrounding the Aug. 8 election. Following the Sept. 1 decision by the Supreme Court to annul the August election, the Center was invited by the IEBC to extend its presence to observe the Oct. 26 fresh election. Long-term observers rejoined the core team on Oct. 4 and were deployed to various locations in the country to observe critical pre- and post-election processes. Because of insecurity surrounding the polls, the uncertain political environment, and the lack of a fully competitive election, the Carter Center deployed a limited election observation mission to assess the Oct. 26 polls. The team was limited in size and geographic scope. Given these factors, the Center did not conduct a robust assessment of polling station level processes on election day. ### "Waging Peace. Fighting Disease. Building Hope." A not-for-profit, nongovernmental organization, The Carter Center has helped to improve life for people in over 80 countries by resolving conflicts; advancing democracy, human rights, and economic opportunity; preventing diseases; and improving mental health care. The Carter Center was founded in 1982 by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter and former First Lady Rosalynn Carter, in partnership with Emory University, to advance peace and health worldwide. If you have just started your journey in an online casino or are looking for a new site to play,... Mexico City government agrees preferential price with CANACEM ICR Newsroom By 08 November 2017 Miguel Angel Mancera, Mayor of Mexico City, has confirmed an agreement between the capitals government and the national cement industry association, CANACEM, to access preferential prices in the acquisition of materials for reconstruction projects. He further explained that the special prices would also apply when the materials were used in earthquake reconstruction of buildings or infrastructure. CANACEM representative, Luis Guillermo Colin, said the industry would provide technical support as part of the agreement. Published under Pakistans cement industry expected to grow 8% 08 November 2017 Pakistans cement consumption grew 16.53 per cent between July-August of this year with a positive outlook for the rest of the year forecast. Domestic cement demand is expected to increase by 8-8.5 per cent per annum on the back of hydropower plants currently under construction or planned as part of the Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) and China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) investments. CPEC is expected to implement three hydropower projects at Karot, Suki Kinari and Kohala over the next 4-5 years, boosting cement demand by 4.6Mta. The total demand required by upcoming hydropower projects in the country is projected to reach 15Mt. In terms of the cement industry, the expansion of cement demand is forecast to result in a local cement capacity utilisation of 74-81 per cent in FY18-21. Published under North Korea Could Be 1 of the Bloodiest Wars in History: How It Would Go Down North Korea is becoming a greater threat with every day that passes. That threat is only exacerbated by the instability in our own president who continues to antagonize Little Rocket Man. The reality is that we may be going to war with North Korea in the very near future if a diplomatic agreement isnt reached. Lets take a quick look at the options we have with North Korea, including a final solution that isnt what youd expect. The Congressional Research Service Report The Congressional Research Service prepared a report called The North Korean Nuclear Challenge: Military Options and Issues for Congress. The report CRS prepared showcases some of the military options that the U.S. has available and what sort of impacts those options will have. It is in no way a roadmap to war, it merely points out some likely options of how things will go down. Next: It seems like were already in the first option. 1. Maintain the military status quo The Trump administration is essentially continuing a policy of Strategic Patience from the Obama administration. The policy is to increase pressure on North Korea by expanding U.S. and international sanctions, emphasizing Chinas ability to pressure North Korea, and coordinating policy with U.S. allies, says the CRS report. There are key differences outlined by the Trump administration. Trumps administration has increased the priority of North Korea, and the administration is openly talking about a preventative military strike against North Korea. Theyre essentially turning up the heat on a volatile situation. Next: Military options are all about how to escalate things in a controlled manner. 2. Surround the kingdom Enhanced containment and deterrence is listed as the next military option in the CRS report. This would take the spirit of the status quo and increase its impact in the region. Pyongyang has complained about the United States military presence in the area, often referred to as unpalatable by the DPRK. The U.S. could increase its military presence in the area by increasing troop levels, pre-positioning equipment, increasing defensive capabilities, and by boosting trilateral cooperation among the United States, South Korea, and Japan. This move has an added bonus of having a more significant presence in the area if hostilities do arise. Next: Lets just start taking targets out. 3. Take out ICBM launch sites If all the semi-peaceful options become exhausted and forceful intervention is required, the first step would be to take out the Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile sites. This would require the first strike and has a multitude of problems associated with it. We could not have an accurate assessment of all the ICBM facilities in North Korea. By initiating that first strike, we could inadvertently force North Korea to launch its nuclear weapons at nearby nations like Korea and Japan, or to our own territory of Guam. The resulting fallout would be in the millions: both in the initial nuclear blast and in the aftermath. Next: Go big or go home. 4. Take out nuclear sites around the country As with taking out ICBM sites, the nuclear sites would need to be a first strike target. Those sites include nuclear production infrastructure, nuclear devices and missile warheads, and associated delivery vehicles. This option is also a more expansive military operation than the previous option. The biggest problem here is the obvious one. The risk of nuclear contamination in the area is extremely high. At best, this option would only set them back by several years but wouldnt actually solve the nuclear problem. Next: This option would lead to millions of deaths all around. 5. A much-needed regime change This is a difficult option because of what would be involved. Not only would you have to take out the nuclear facilities and launch sites around the country and face dangers associated with them, you would also have to destroy command and control facilities, key leaders, artillery and missile units, chemical and biological weapons facilities, airfields, ports, and other targets deemed critical to regime survival. This operation would certainly lead to full-scale war and be the worst possible situation strategically for the United States. Next: The final option 6. We pull out Yes, the option that no one really considers, but is a possibility, is that we pull out of the area entirely. This would only occur if the DPRK was willing to agree to a full-scale denuclearization. Some have argued that the only reason weve gotten to this point is the United States presence in the region. We may be able to stabilize the region and increase global security without having to fire a shot. The only problem is that there is very little faith that the DPRK would ever adhere to those terms. So far they have gone back on nearly every deal made with the west and continue to hold the United States as their main enemy. Next: Will any of the options be used? The Korean Peninsula is a complete quagmire Trying to predict what is going to happen with North Korea is almost impossible to do. The report compiled by the CRS points to an observer saying how things will unfold on the Korean peninsula: a very complex game of three-dimensional chess in terms of tic-tac-toe. Next: The scariest part of all this We dont know North Koreas true capabilities North Korea has exploded a nuclear weapon underground, as well as testing ballistic missiles capable of reaching the U.S. mainland. While it has not demonstrated it can put two and two together, it has not demonstrated it cant. If you attack them after they have the nuclear weapons, its not a preventive war. Its just a plain old nuclear war, said Jeffrey Lewis, a nonproliferation expert at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies. CNN reported that experts recommend caution where the Kim regime is concerned. Just as its dictators motives remain cloudy, so does the countrys exact arsenal. One Trump official cautioned against understating the threat, noting that in 1950, the Norths strength was also underestimated. Next: What does North Korea really want in the end? We also dont know North Koreas true motives Anybody who tells you what North Korea wants is lying, or theyre guessing, said Jon Wolfsthal, a scholar in the nuclear policy program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and former senior director for arms control and nonproliferation in the National Security Council. According to The New York Times, Kim likely wants to demonstrate his ability to attack the U.S. with nuclear missiles as a form of self-defense. Some of Trumps advisers believe he wants to force the U.S. to withdraw sanctions and pull troops from South Korea. Analysts diverge on what he would do if that did happen. Dean of the graduate school of international studies at Yonsei University, Mo Jongryn, said it is important to take threats seriously. Recent actions suggest thats wise. Follow The Cheat Sheet on Facebook! The U.S. President and First Lady With the Biggest Age Gap May Surprise You What is it that keeps us so fascinated with first ladies? Maybe its their influence on the president, their public eye fashion, or their ability to enact change from the passenger seat. Either way, the age difference between President Donald Trump and his first lady Melania Trump got us thinking about the widest age gaps between presidents through the ages. Heres our countdown, with some fun presidential marriage facts. 16. Calvin and Grace Coolidge: 7 years Grace was 26 years old when she married Calvin Coolidge on Oct. 4, 1905. In the simple ceremony, Grace Coolidge wore gray and carried no flowers. Just a handful of relatives and friends attended the ceremony. In the White House, animal-lover Coolidge kept a pet raccoon named Rebecca. Next: This couple threw a serious shindig for their wedding. 15. Chester and Ellen Arthur: 7 years Ellen was 22 when she married Chester Alan Arthur on Oct. 29, 1859. Records indicate that the wedding reception was lavish, the rooms filled with hanging baskets, vases, and table bouquets of flowers, fruit baskets, and thousands of stewed, pickled, and raw oysters, lobster, and chicken salads, champagnes, brandy, whiskey, sherry, rum, and Curacao. Sounds like a party! Next: This first lady gave some stringent standards for their engagement. 14. James K. and Sarah Polk: 8 years Anecdotal tradition claims that the future Sarah Polk teased James K. Polk that she would marry him only after he had been elected to political office in his own right. At the completion of his service as Senate clerk, he was elected to the state legislature in 1823. They married on Jan. 1 the following year. Next: This negotiation ended well for the president. 13. John Quincy and Louisa Adams: 8 years Louisa Adams was the first first lady born outside of the United States. She was 22 when she married John Quincy Adams on July 26, 1797, in her birthplace of London, England. Shortly after their wedding, the couple had planned to sail to Lisbon, Portugal, so Adams could assume a new diplomatic mission. When they married, Adams was reassigned by his father (who had, at that point, been president of the United States for four months) to serve as minister to Prussia. The wedding of the presidents son to a British-born subject attracted national press back in the United States. The Boston Independent Chronicle noted, Young John Adams Negotiations have terminated in a Marriage Treaty with an English lady. Next: This first lady led a tragic life after her husband passed away. 12. Abraham and Mary Todd Lincoln: 9 years Mary Todd was 23 when she married Abraham Lincoln on Nov. 4, 1842. On Jan. 1, 1841, Abraham Lincoln broke his initial engagement to Mary Todd, several months after she accepted. For the first two years of their marriage, they lived at the Globe Tavern in Springfield. Deeply traumatized by her husbands assassination, she showed signs of mental illness. In 1875, her son Robert had her committed to the Bellevue Insane Asylum, in Batavia, Ill. She twice attempted suicide by taking what she believed to be the drugs laudanum and camphor which the suspicious pharmacist had replaced with sugar. One of the nations first women lawyers, Myra Bradwell, filed an appeal on Lincolns behalf and after four months of confinement, the former first lady was released to the care of her sister Elizabeth Edwards in Springfield. Once a second trial on June 19, 1876, declared her sane, she moved to France. Next: While not a book person, this first lady showed a sense of humor in her letters. 11. Rutherford B. and Lucy Hayes: 9 years The former Lucy Webb married Rutherford Birchard Hayes on Dec. 30, 1852. The mother of Hayes, a friend of Webbs mother, encouraged a match between the two. Hayes fell in love with Webb but wanted to make her more intellectual. The president said that if she read more literature, practiced writing, and had more frequent and closer contact with cultivated and intellectual individuals, she would enlarge herself to her fullest mental capacities. Throughout her life, she wrote letters sparingly but often included self-deprecatory humor. Next: This first lady became known as a fashionista. 10. James and Elizabeth Monroe: 10 years When Elizabeth was 17 years old, she married James Monroe on Feb. 16, 1786. The couple took a honeymoon on Long Island and then lived in the first U.S. capital city of New York with her father. Recognizing the importance placed on social behavior and appearance at the time, Elizabeth Monroe cultivated a persona that embodied the casualness of American customs while respecting old-world European protocol. It earned her the nickname La Belle Americane. Next: This first lady lived in a state-of-the-art home before the White House. 9. Ronald and Nancy Reagan: 11 years Nancy and Ronald Reagan married on March 6, 1952, when she was 30 years old. After a honeymoon at the Mission Inn in Riverside, Calif., and Phoenix, Ariz., the Reagans eventually settled in a modern home in the Pacific Palisades section of Los Angeles. General Electric, for whom Reagan then served as national spokesman, built and outfitted the house with all of the companys latest technology. Nancy Reagans godmother was the actress Alla Nazimova. Next: After her husband died, this first lady took up some of her own causes. 8. John F. and Jacqueline Kennedy: 12 years The Kennedys married Sept. 12, 1953. Jackie Kennedy became politically active after her husbands assassination in 1963. She successfully sought President Lyndon Johnsons support for several measures, including the revitalization of Pennsylvania Avenue. She later involved herself in the creation of the John F. Kennedy Library and the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. The former first lady also led an effort to halt the potential damage in Venice posed by rising water levels, and attempted to broker better diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Cambodia. Next: This president had it bad for his teacher. 7. Millard and Abigail Fillmore: 13 years Abigail was 30 years old when she married Millard Fillmore on Feb. 5, 1826. In 1819, Abigail Fillmore originally met her husband when he came to enroll at the New Hope Academy. Before that, he had only rudimentary frontier-school lessons in arithmetic, reading, and writing. Because he previously served as an indentured servant in farming, accounting, chopping wood for lumber, and making cloth, he lacked a continuous education. She helped him learn and they studied together. When his family moved and they later became separated, Millard Fillmore realized he had fallen in love with his teacher. The pair kept in touch by letter for three years before they eventually reunited. Next: This courtship became something of a scandal, at the time. 6. Woodrow and Edith Wilson: 15 years Woodrow Wilson married Edith Bolling Galt when he was already president, on Dec. 18, 1915. His first wife of 29 years, the former Ellen Axson, died the year before. Edith Wilson then met the president while he was still officially in mourning for his first wife, which made their romance a bit of a scandal. Edith Wilson later became known as the secret president for handling many of Woodrow Wilsons duties after he became partially paralyzed by a stroke in 1919. Next: Rumors tried to take down this first ladys character. 5. James and Dolley Madison: 17 years James Madison remained a bachelor throughout the Revolutionary War and beyond, marrying the former Dolley Payne Todd on Sept. 15, 1794, when she was 26. During the 1808 election, Federalist newspapers in Baltimore and Boston implied Madison had intimate relations with President Jefferson as a way of attacking her character. Her popularity later prevailed during the 1812 election. Next: This first lady doesnt have much interest in the job. 4. Donald and Melania Trump: 24 years The former Melanija Knavs, the daughter of a former Communist party member, grew up in Slovenia and dropped out of design school to become a model. She met Donald Trump at a party in 1998. They later married at Trumps Mar-a-Lago resort in 2005. A quiet person who keeps her own counsel, Melania Trump opted to remain in New York City while her young son, Barron, finished out the school year. In her place, Donald Trumps daughter Ivanka Trump moved her office into the White House and subsequently made many public appearances the first lady would normally take on. Next: The next presidents wife didnt live in the White House, but well count it anyway. 3. Benjamin and Mary Scott Lord Harrison: 25 years While not technically a first lady, the former Mary Scott Lord Dimmick married Benjamin Harrison on April 6, 1896, three years after he left office. Dimmick was 37 at the time of the wedding. She was also the niece of Caroline Harrison, the presidents first wife. Next: This president met his future wife when she still wore diapers. 2. Grover and Frances Cleveland: 28 years Grover Cleveland and the former Frances Folson held the only presidential wedding ever on the White House grounds on June 2, 1886. She was the daughter of one of Clevelands good friends. According to William DeGregorios The Complete Book of U.S. Presidents, Cleveland at 27 met his future wife shortly after she was born. He took an avuncular interest in the child, buying her a baby carriage and otherwise doting on her as she grew up. Next: The age gap wins the top slot. 1. John and Julia Tyler: 30 years John Tyler takes the prize for largest presidential age gap, at 30 years. He remains the first president ever married in office, when he wed the former Julia Gardiner on June 26, 1844. The Gardiner family went into mourning after what they called the elopement of the couple, having held a small ceremony with only 12 guests. The new presidential bride became the object of enormous public fascination, turning out crowds of thousands to see her. A two-hour White House wedding reception took place on June 28, 1844, with a wedding cake displayed in the Blue Room. Follow The Cheat Sheet on Facebook! Game of Thrones has become an enormous hit since debuting on HBO in 2011, but the epic fantasy drama was almost a very different show. After the original pilot failed to impress, the series underwent major cast changes. There were also some instances in which the network wasnt able to nab its top choice for certain roles. Thats right believe it or not, several high-profile actors have admitted to declining an offer to star on the show in its early years, only to kick themselves for the decision later on. Below, check out seven stars who have turned down roles on Game of Thrones. 1. Brian Cox The actor admitted to turning down a Game of Thrones role early on in the series, reportedly because he wasnt offered a high enough salary. Though Brian Cox didnt reveal which role hed been approached for, he confesses that he now regrets the decision, having become a fan of the series. Well, stupidly, I turned it down in the early days because they didnt pay enough money [laughs]. Now they have more money. And I was silly. I was silly, it was silly, because Im a complete addict now, he told Vodzilla, also adding, I dont know what I could play. Maybe I could do I mean, I just watched my friend Ian McShane, and I thought, Ooh, Ians in it, so I settled down to watch him. And I thought, Ian did that? and immediately I thought, God, they must have paid him well, because I know Ian! [laughs] He went on to praise an episode of the HBO drama and also made sure to add that hed be up for joining the series if the network is still interested. Im still waiting for the call for Game of Thrones and if theyve got more decent money, Ill be there! he said. 2. Dominic West Back in 2012, Dominic West admitted to The Huffington Post that he had once been offered a role on Game of Thrones, but turned it down to avoid being away from his family for too long. I was offered something on Game of Thrones and unfortunately, I hadnt seen it, but my nephew and his father said, Gosh, Game of Thrones is the only great show on! And I felt terrible, because Id just turned them down, he said. Though the former The Wire actor couldnt remember the name of the character he had been in line to play, he said that the role was a substantial one and would have required being in Reykjavik, Iceland for six months. It was a lovely part, a good part. Im going to regret it, he said, per The Huffington Post, which speculates that the role may have been that of wildling chief Mance Rayder. My problem is, Ive got four kids, and at the moment, Im reluctant to be away from home for a long time. I can get a lot of work in London and still be at home. 3. Gillian Anderson In 2013, Gillian Anderson revealed that her decision to turn down roles in both Game of Thrones and Downton Abbey left her teen daughter dumbfounded. Whether its Game Of Thrones or Downton Abbey, my 18-year-old cannot believe Ive turned down things she loves, the actress told Stylist magazine. But with a four and six-year-old, I cant justify spending that kind of time away from home unless Im working with Martin Scorsese. Anderson never confirmed which role she was in line for, but its been widely speculated that she may have been up for the part of the ruthless Cersei Lannister. 4. Jonathan Pryce Jonathan Pryce was cast as the High Sparrow in Game of Thrones Season 5, but it actually wasnt the first time he was offered a role on the show. The actor was initially up for a part in the freshman season of the series, but turned it down because he wasnt a fan of the genre. I dont like swords and fantasy things. I am that person who has never seen Star Wars, Ive never seen any of the Lord of the Rings things and Id never seen Game of Thrones, Pryce told BBC Radio 4.In fact Id said no to the very original series of Game of Thrones and all I did was flip through and look at the names, these strange names, strange dialogue and I thought oh, its not for me.' Thankfully, Pryce got a second chance and had a change of heart several years later when he was offered the role of the High Sparrow on the show, which he described as a great character. 5. Mark Strong Strong has never commented on his almost-role in Game of Thrones, but speculation is that the actor was a top contender to play the character of Stannis Baratheon, who made his debut in Season 2. Strong reportedly backed out of the role to star in AMCs 2013 remake, Low Winter Sun. Unfortunately for Strong, that show was canceled after only one season. Meanwhile, Stephen Dillane was eventually cast to portray Stannis on Game of Thrones. 6. Perdita Weeks Perdita Weeks previously played Mary Boleyn on Showtimes The Tudors, and her experience with period dramas reportedly helped her land the part of Edmure Tullys bride, Roslin Frey, in Game of Thrones. But the actress was forced to turn down the role after a scheduling conflict with another project. When that other project fell through, Weeks reportedly called the shows producers to ask for the part back, but she had already been replaced by Alexandra Dowling. 7. Ray Stevenson In 2015, Stevenson confirmed that he had previously been offered a role on the HBO show, but turned it down because he felt it was too late in the series to make much of an impact. I was offered [a role]. I also saw them before they even started, very early on, he told Movies.com. I would rather have been [cast] at the beginning. Its just that coming into a show nowI think its wonderful, but its not something I would come into at this point. I dont know if I would add anything to it at this stage. And Im off doing Blackbeard [on Black Sails], so there you go. He didnt reveal the exact role he was offered, but explained, I was offered a 4-6 month stint. [The show] was just too far down the line for me. Having already been seen at the beginning, I would rather have been involved in the growth of a show, even though everyone gets bumped off left, right and center. I kept seeing all the people I knew from Rome in it! But I cant, man! I cant! But good on them. Check out Entertainment Cheat Sheet on Facebook! All votes in the CO-3 election won't be counted until the end of this week A decade after Muslims attacked and displaced Christians in a town in northern Nigeria, Kano state officials have forbidden church buildings to be rebuilt there, sources said. Eight church buildings destroyed in late September 2007 in predominantly Muslim Tudun Wada Dankadai, Kano state, are still in ruins, a Morning Star News correspondent observed earlier this month. The buildings of St. Marys Catholic, Evangelical Church Winning All (ECWA), Baptist, Assemblies of God, Charismatic Renewal, Mountain of Fire and Miracle and Deeper Christian Life Bible churches, along with that of another church, have not been rebuilt because local Muslims have refused to allow it, Joseph Opeyemi Ibinkule, a 42-year-old a Christian resident of Tudun Wada Dankadai, told Morning Star News. Christians who have braved it and returned after the attacks in 2007 have no worship buildings up to today, Ibinkule said. The reason is that the government of Kano state has banned us from rebuilding our churches. No pastor lives in the town, he said, and only a few come to lead services to a smattering of church members in the hostile environment. These are the ECWA pastor and the Catholic priest, he said. Both of live in the city of Kano and only come to conduct services under trees for their members. Kano state officials declined to comment to Morning Star News. Ibinkunle said the 2007 assault, in which at least nine Christians were killed, was ignited by Muslim students accusing high school Christians of blasphemy. The Muslim students attacked Christian students, and soon they were joined by Muslims in this town, he said. All eight churches were destroyed, Christians were displaced, and many Christians were also killed. I personally saw three corpses of members of the St. Marys Catholic Church who were killed by the Muslim attackers. The attack was premeditated, and then it led to further spontaneous violence, he said. Church buildings were burned, and houses and shops of Christians were looted and charred, he added. Advocacy group Christian Solidarity Worldwide reported in 2007 that the violence began after Muslim students stormed into a room shared by two Christian students at the Government Secondary School in Tudun Wada and began to assault them. When the Christian students asked what they had done wrong, their assailants initially told them to mind their own business, CSW reported. However, once the school principal arrived at the scene, the Christians were accused of drawing a picture of Muhammad on a mosque wall and of planning an assault on Muslim students. Local authorities appeared to limit access to the area to obscure inquiry into the extent of the casualties, according to CSW. Tudun Wadas chief of police sealed the area off, and local authorities transported Christians out of the area and removed all corpses. Those trying to help victims were denied access, CSW reported. Three Mountain of Fire pastors in Kano City were temporarily detained when they attempted to evacuate members of their denomination, according to CSW. As a result of this enforced isolation of the area, the exact number of fatalities is difficult to determine, CSW reported. However, sources suspect that the toll is far higher than originally stated. One policeman was overheard complaining of being fed up of packing corpses. The son of an Apostolic Church pastor, Ibinkunle said he has been worshipping under a tree with the members of the ECWA congregation since the 2007 attack. Court Efforts ECWA leaders in Tudun Wada have taken the Kano state government to court for prohibiting them from reconstructing the church buildings. The Kano state government stopped us from rebuilding the destroyed ECWA church in Tudun Wada, so we have taken the matter to court, and we hope we shall get justice at the end of the case, the Rev. Murtala Marti Dangora, vice chairman of the Kano State Chapter of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), told Morning Star News. The Rev. Ayuba Hassan, chairman of Tudun Wada chapter of CAN, said the ECWA is the only church trying to reestablish itself in Tudun Wada. We currently worship under a tree and have continued to insist that we be allowed to rebuild our place of worship, Hassan said. The government is not ready to allow us do so, as they claim that the Muslims in the town do not want to have any church there. We are waiting for the outcome of the case in court. Officers at the police station at Tudun Wada confirmed that there is no church building standing in the town. Asked where the ECWA church was located, an officer told Morning Star News, Do you see that tree over there? Thats where the ECWA church is. Near the tree where the ECWA building once stood was part of its wall with an inscription by the Kano State Land and Survey agency warning against redevelopment of the land. Morning Star News returned to the police station and remarked to the officer that only the ruins of the church building remained near the tree. Dont you know that there is no church in Tudun Wada Dankandai? he said. Asked about the church pastor, he said, Sorry, the pastor does not stay in this town; he comes from Kano on Sundays. I also worship with them under a tree you see there. Thats where we worship. If you would like to help persecuted Christians, visit http://morningstarnews.o rg/resources/aid-agencies/ for a list of organizations that can orient you on how to get involved. If you or your organization would like to help enable Morning Star News to continue raising awareness of persecuted Christians worldwide with original-content reporting, please consider collaborating at http://morningstarnews.org/don ate/ ? I had the privilege or reading a pre-release version of "God Shines Forth: How the Nature of God Shapes and Drives the Mission of the Church." Here are 20 quotes from the book, which you should pick up. Am I right to pray for Donald Trump's downfall? What would you say if you had the opportunity to meet Donald Trump face to face? It might seem an entirely hypothetical question, but you never know... Only two weeks ago I unexpectedly bumped into former Prime Minister David Cameron on a footpath in Cornwall. I had sight of him in enough time to consider what I wanted to say to him from a Christian perspective and then did. And last week my wife by chance encountered Labour MP and social justice campaigner Frank Field in a supermarket. Again, she was able to speak with him from a faith-based point of view. It does seem unlikely most of us will ever meet President Trump, who was elected a year ago this week (or at least he won a majority in the electoral college, albeit with 3 million fewer votes than Hilary Clinton). But even if we never see him fact to face, we can go one better, of course, because as Christians we can pray for him. After all, the New Testament encourages us all to pray for 'all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness,' (1 Timothy 2:2). And yet, if I am honest, I struggle to pray along those lines for him. In fact, to be candid, I routinely pray that he will be removed peacefully from office. Here's why: 1. He has brought shame on the United States of America. Most people around the world are no doubt bright enough to realise that Donald Trump is not typical of all Americans, nor is he a personification of the nation. But there is no doubt that in the eyes of much of the rest of the world he is an embarrassment to the USA. Here in the UK we have envied some of America's past presidents (Obama, Kennedy), while others have puzzled us (Reagan) or exasperated us (George W Bush). But I don't think any have generated quite the sense of revulsion, frankly, that Donald Trump has managed to produce. And that's not great for global perceptions of the United States. 2. He has brought shame on the office of president. He's not the first, of course. One might think of Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton among his recent predecessors, for example. But at least they were (for better or worse) trying to give the appearance of being presidential. Trump either doesn't care about that or is manifestly unable to do so. Christian leader John Piper had it about right when he wrote that Trump's 'immoral behaviour in the past, and his ongoing unwillingness to renounce it as evil, show that he is morally unfit to lead'. And Christian author Randy Alcorn has said: 'My main problem is not that Donald Trump says what he thinks. ...My problem is with what he actually thinks: especially his obsession with outward appearance, sexiness, superficiality, wealth, his own status and accomplishments, and his quickness to berate and insult people and seek revenge on his critics.' That's even before we consider his views in relation to the scientific consensus on global warming and the Paris climate change deal. 3. He has brought shame on the gospel. The writer Josiah Hesse, who heart-breakingly describes himself as a 'a recovering "Christaholic", 12 years sober from God,' has attempted to analyse why many American evangelicals have attached themselves to Trump despite his egregious flaws. In the London-based Guardian newspaper, Hesse suggested that many do not believe Trump is a real Christian, but nonetheless like his policies. More than that, however, he wrote that at heart 'evangelicals recognise a fellow outsider in Trump, someone not only unafraid to shake things up and offend people, but who actively goes out of his way to do it'. Well, if that's the case it is a tragedy for the gospel and a searing indictment of contemporary American evangelicalism. Can it really be marked by a joy in provocatively offending others? I hope Hesse is wrong. But either way, if for any reason at all many Americans come to associate such a manifestly inappropriate president with the Christian faith, that's tragic. So I pray on, perhaps misguidedly, in the way I do. After all, Christians prayed in a very committed way for the fall of East European communism and South African apartheid, and we have seen what happened in both those contexts. I have previously prayed for a UK prime minister to fall, and the answer then was 'yes'. John Piper would argue there is much more to be said about praying for Donald Trump. And without doubt John Piper is more godly than I am. But as for me, for now, I will continue to 'pray as I can, not as I can't' while as I do, asking for God's will to be over-rule. And if you can pray in a better way for this disturbing and alarming president, then please, let me encourage you to do so. David Baker is a former daily newspaper journalist now working as an Anglican minister in Sussex, England. Find him on Twitter @Baker_David_A How the Genesis story of Abraham is the blue-print for Jewish history G-d has told Abram to make a clean break. His birth place, relatives and home life are not the future of humanity. Abram is to look inwards and then leave Mesopotamia for ever. According to Jewish tradition Abram was born 1948 years after Creation, and his abandoning of his beginnings is one of 10 trials imposed on him by G-d. Abram was 75 and Sarai was 65 when, having achieved status and prosperity, they were forced by G-d to leave security in order to establish the Eretz Israel (the Land of Israel), which G-d chose to grant to the Jewish people as their eternal patrimony. Moreover, Abram and Sarai were to do this alone. Abram is called an Ivri [Hebrew], meaning 'someone who comes from the other side'. The Jewish people whom he would father were not to belong to the general culture, but would always be 'a people who walk alone'. Popularity, G-d is saying, may be pleasant, but it is ultimately a snare. The Jewish people have been around for 3,800 years and it is a future leader of the Jewish people, Joshua, who based himself on this promise to Abram when he wrote the second part of the blessing that observant Jews say after meals: We give thanks to You, Lord our G-d. because You gave our forefathers as a heritage a desirable, good and spacious land ...' Abram was born 1948 years after Creation. In Jewish tradition we make the link: In 1948 CE the State of Israel was eventually recreated, 30 years after the Balfour Declaration of 1917. In 1917, the future first Chief Rabbi of Israel in modern times, Rav Avraham Kook, happened to be in London, having been stranded in Switzerland as a result of WWI. Rav Kook was appointed as a temporary rabbi to the congregation in London, on the strict understanding that he would return unhindered to Eretz Israel when war was over. Soon after his arrival in London, Rav Kook had to battle Jews who were working to undermine the Jewish people's hopes of national rebirth in Eretz Israel. In a public notice in response to what he called 'this national treachery', Rav Kook harshly condemned all those 'who tear apart the Jewish soul'. 'The entire debate whether it is our national or our religious heritage that preserves and sustains us as Jews is a bitter mockery. The perfection of 'You are one and Your Name is one, and who is like Your nation, Israel, one nation in the land' is indivisible.' Rav Kook's statement described the cruel injustices perpetrated by the nations towards the Jewish people over the centuries. Rav Kook in London demanded that the nations atone for their terrible crimes by returning Eretz Israel to the Jewish people and help establish an independent Jewish state. His letter was read in all British synagogues after the reading of the Torah and made a deep impression. Rav Kook then sent an additional letter urging the members of all British synagogues immediately to request that the British government 'aid us in our demand to return to our holy land, as our eternal national home.' After the Balfour Declaration was passed on November 2nd 2017 the Jewish leaders held a large celebratory banquet in London, at which Rav Kook spoke: 'I come not only to thank the British nation, but even more, to congratulate it for the privilege of making this declaration. The Jewish nation is the scholar among the nations, the people of the Book, a nation of prophets, and it is a great honour for any nation to aid it. I bless the British nation for having extended such honourable aid to the people of the Torah, so that they may return to their land and renew their homeland....' And later he wrote: 'This sequence of events began with the immigration of the disciples of the Baal Shem Tov and the Vilna Gaon to Eretz Israel [in the 18th century]. They were followed by the awakening of the Hibbat Zion movement and the establishment of the first communities. The Zionism founded by Herzl, the settling of the land by the pioneers of the 2nd Aliyah [1904-14], the Balfour Declaration and the affirmation of the mandate in San Remo by the League of Nations [1920] - these are the latest developments. Taken individually, each event may be explained in a rational manner. But when they are viewed together, we may discern a wondrous chain of complementary links created and guided by a Divine hand.' Rav Kook became the first Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel under the British Mandate, from 1921 until his death in 1935. On November 4th, last Shabbat, when Jews all over the world read the story of Abraham in synagogues all over the UK, the following prayer by Chief Rabbi Mirvis was read out to celebrate the centenary of the Balfour Declaration, which had been put in motion by Rav Kook's endeavours 100 years earlier, following in the footsteps of our father, Abraham: 'Heavenly Father, Rock and Redeemer of Israel, on this day we come before You in a spirit of thanksgiving and supplication. 'Since the dawn of time, You have graciously bestowed ceaseless blessings upon Your people. In every generation, when enemies have sought to destroy us Your lovingkindness and Your miracles have brought us salvation and redeemed us. 'In this spirit, one hundred years ago, You blessed the British Government with the wisdom and understanding to declare its support for the establishment of a Jewish state in accordance with Your Divine will, as it is written: 'Through me, kings reign and leaders decree justly' (Proverbs 8: 15). 'That historic support heralded a century in which the dream of living, working and declaring Your praise in the land of our forebears became a reality. It paved the way for a State in which we study, celebrate and cherish your precious Torah, in all of its boundless beauty, more than in any other place or at an other times, as it is written: 'For out of of Zion shall go forth the Torah and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem' (Isaiah 2:3). 'Almighty G-d of Abraham and Sarah, who faithfully fulfilled Your commandment to settle in Your holy land, since our exile, you have heard the prayers of our ancestors in every generation, who never lost hope in the dream of a return to Zion in joy. Just as You answered our prayers to live as a free people in our own land, we now beseech You to hear our prayers to live in amity and harmony with our neighbours under the tabernacle of Your peace, as it is written; 'No longer will violence be heard in your land, nor ruin or destruction within your borders.' (Isaiah 60:18). Lord, full of compassion, we pray that You remember the souls of all those who have given their lives for the sake of the State and to whom we owe an eternal debt of gratitude. May we be worthy to see the words of Your prophets fulfilled, a time when You 'will judge between the nations and settle disputes for many peoples. They will beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war any more.' (Isaiah 2:4).' And so we can see the link from G-d through Abram (who later became Abraham), through the Jewish people, through the 4 empires who tried to destroy us, through the fortuitous presence in London of Rav Abraham Kook, who didn't even know English when he arrived, and was later appointed by the British as first Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of their mandated territory, which was finally given back to the Jewish people in 1948, the same year as the year after creation according to Jewish tradition in which our forefather Abraham himself was born. Dr Irene Lancaster is a Jewish academic, author and translator who has established university courses on Jewish history, Jewish studies and the Hebrew Bible. She lives in Greater Manchester and is chair of the Broughton Park Dialogue Group which just celebrated its ninth anniversary. 'I don't understand, but I know my God does': Tearful pastor and wife speak of losing their daughter in church shooting The pastor at First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs and his wife have spoken about losing their 14-year-old daughter during the shooting there on Sunday which left 26 people dead. Annabelle Pomeroy's adoptive father, Frank Pomeroy, who had been out of town during the attack in Texas, said at a tearful press conference yesterday: 'I don't understand, but I know my God does.' Frank described Annabelle, known as Belle, as 'one beautiful girl' and a 'special child'. His wife, Sherri Pomeroy, said: 'We lost more than Belle yesterday. And one thing that gives me a sliver of encouragement is that Belle was surrounded yesterday by her family that she loved fiercely.' Sherri continued: 'We ate together, we laughed together, we cried together, and we worshiped together. Now most of our church family is gone, our building is probably beyond repair and the few of us that are left behind lost tragically yesterday. As senseless as this tragedy was, our sweet Belle would not have been able to deal with losing so much family.' The couple urged people: 'Please don't forget Sutherland Springs.' Annabelle was a seventh grader at Briesemeister Middle School and the school district have made therapists available to students who feel affected by the shooting. Her uncle, Scott Pomeroy, wrote on Facebook: 'Heaven truly gained a real beautiful angel this morning along with many more'. All those killed at the church on Sunday, he wrote, 'have taken their last breath of dirty air and took their first breath of heavenly air with new bodies with no pain and suffering'. As well as the 26 who were killed in what was the biggest shooting in Texan history on Sunday, 20 more were injured. The victims included a heavily pregnant woman and reportedly five other members of her family, and ranged in age from 18 months to 77, with two killed outside the church, 23 killed inside, and one person who died after medical transport. The victims also included the stand-in pastor for the Pomeroys, Bryan Holcombe. Witnesses say that he was the first to be struck. 'Bryan was filling in,' one witness told DailyMail.com. 'He was walking up to the pulpit when he was shot in the back. He was an awesome Christian.' Holcombe was killed alongside his wife of 25 years, Sunday school teacher Karla Holcombe, their son Marc Daniel 'Danny' Holcombe, 36, and his one-year-old daughter Noah. Pope warned by Myanmar Cardinal not to speak of the 'Rohingya' Myanmar's Cardinal has reiterated warnings that Pope Francis should avoid using the term 'Rohingya' during a visit this month, when he is expected to raise the humanitarian crisis faced by the Muslim minority after a Myanmar army offensive in August. The Pope is set to visit largely Buddhist Myanmar from November 27 to November 30, before going to Bangladesh, a predominantly Muslim neighbour where more than 600,000 Rohingya have fled to take shelter in refugee camps. In the first visit by a Pope to Myanmar, Francis will meet Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel peace laureate who leads a civilian administration that is less than two years old, the generals it has to share power with, and leading Buddhist monks. Cardinal Charles Maung Bo told Reuters that the Pope would raise the need to provide assistance to the Muslim minority, saying: 'These are people who are suffering and these are the people in need of help now.' Francis has used the term Rohingya when he has spoken about their suffering in the recent past. But Suu Kyi has asked foreign leaders not to use the term Rohingya, because in her view it is inflammatory. Bo, appointed by Pope Francis in 2015 as Myanmar's first and only cardinal, said church leaders in the country had advised him to sidestep the divisive issue of the name. 'We have asked him at least to refrain from using the word "Rohingya" because this word is very much contested and not acceptable by the military, nor the government, nor the people in Myanmar,' Bo said in an interview in Yangon. It was unclear if the Pope would heed the advice, Bo added, but if he did so, it would not be to politicise the issue or endorse the Rohingya right to Myanmar citizenship, 'but he just wants to identify this particular group who call themselves "Rohingya"'. Many people in Myanmar regard the largely stateless Rohingya as illegal immigrants from Bangladesh, and they are excluded from the 135 'national races' recognised by law. Regardless of Myanmar's sensitivities, however, the United Nations and US continue to call them Rohingya, upholding their right to self-identify. Francis will highlight the importance of resolving the refugee crisis through dialogue between Myanmar and Bangladesh and with the help of the international community, Bo added. Myanmar has said Rohingya who can prove they were resident would be allowed to return, but the two countries have still to agree how the repatriation should be carried out. 'These are the people who do not enjoy the citizenship and are somewhat unwanted in both countries,' said Bo, referring to Myanmar and Bangladesh. 'They are also human beings, they have a human face and they also need human dignity, so eliminating or killing any one of them, that's not justified,' Bo said, referring to the group as 'our brothers and sisters'. Francis will celebrate a mass in Yangon that is expected to draw around 200,000 people, Bo said, adding that Buddhists, Muslims, and those of other faiths were welcome to attend. Myanmar has about 700,000 Roman Catholics, said Bo, from among a population of more than 51 million. The UN has denounced the violence in Myanmar's north-west over the past 10 weeks as a textbook example of ethnic cleansing, a charge Suu Kyi's administration has denied, while saying accusations of rights abuses should be investigated. Myanmar's military says its counter-insurgency clearance operation was provoked by Rohingya militants' attacks on about 30 security posts on August 25. In the following days, the Pope spoke about 'the persecution of our Rohingya brothers and sisters' and asked Catholics to pray for them, adding that they should be given 'their full rights'. Additional reporting by Reuters. 'Stranger Things' news: Shannon Purser defends her co-star from disappointed fans It seems Barb (Shannon Purser) is sisterly not only in "Stranger Things" but in real life as well, as Purser defended co-star Finn Wolfhard, who plays Mike, after his fans' public outcry on Twitter. Wolfhard, one of the protagonists in Netflix's "Stranger Things," is under fire in social media, as the 14-year-old actor snubbed some of his die-hard fans who were waiting for him outside his hotel. The fans were somehow expecting the actor to sign autographs for them or pose for selfies, to their disappointment. They even took to Twitter to say that the actor was "heartless" and allegedly rude. Purser, on the other hand, came to the boy's defense, expressing that under no circumstances are actors and actresses required to stop whatever they're doing personally for anyone. "Okay, no. No actor is under any obligation to stop for anyone. Finn is an incredibly kind human. But he's human and he needs breaks too," said Purser, implying that the actor was also tired and needed some rest from his career. The actress then went on to say that she has also experienced similar, albeit smaller, crowds ambushing her outside lobbies, entrances, and exits, and these have caused her stress. However, as an adult, Purser is better equipped to handle such events, and she said she was able to shrug them off or even grant the fans their wishes. Wolfhard, on the other hand, being only 14, would find this difficult and intimidating according to the actress. "So, from one big sister to the world, don't you DARE make young actors feel guilty or indebted to you because they couldn't say 'Hi,'" warned Purser. On a final note, she also stated that fans should not take advantage of stars loving their fans and ask that they be considerate of the need for personal space. Barb is a character from "Stranger Things" season 1. She disappeared and was presumably taken by a Demogorgon. She has since spawned her own fan base due to her memorable character. Texas church shooter once taught at Bible school but was really an atheist who once said people who believe in God are stupid Devin Kelley, the 26-year-old suspect in the mass shooting at First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs that left at least 26 people dead and another 20 injured, was an avowed atheist who once taught Vacation Bible School. Kelley, who lived in New Braunfels, Texas, died shortly after the attack on the church Sunday. A motive for the attack remains unclear but people familiar with Kelley said he constantly expressed disdain for people of faith on social media. "He was the first atheist I met. He went Air Force after high school, got discharged but I don't know why," Patrick Boyce, who attended New Braunfels High School with Kelley, told DailyMail.com. "He had a kid or two, fairly normal, but kinda quiet and lately seemed depressed," Boyce continued. "I was just shocked [to hear the news]. Still haven't quite processed how he could have done that." Kelley had previously served in the Air Force at a base in New Mexico but received a "bad conduct" discharge in 2014 related to charges of assaulting his wife and child in 2012, The New York Times reported. Nina Rose Nava, who also went to school with Kelley, wrote on Facebook how he would dismiss Christians as "stupid." "In in complete shock! I legit just deleted him off my fb 'cause I couldn't stand his post. He was always talking about how people who believe in God we're stupid and trying to preach his atheism," Nava wrote. Despite his atheism, however, she told DailyMail.com that the shooting was "not something I expected from him." "He was an outcast but not a loner. He was popular among other outcast. I haven't spoke to him since high school," she said. Kelley's avowed atheism seems in sharp contrast to his history as a Vacation Bible School volunteer teacher at First Baptist Church in Kingsville. He claimed on LinkedIn that for the entire month of June 2013, he helped the minds of children, 4-6 years old, "grow and prosper." In a statement late Sunday, however, First Baptist Church Kingsville downplayed his work and affiliation with the church. "Media reports have made a connection between Devin Patrick Kelley and First Baptist Church of Kingsville, Texas. According to our records, Kelley volunteered one night as a helper during the 2014 Vacation Bible School. He was not a member of the First Baptist Church of Kingsville, nor did he serve in any other capacity," the church said. "Our congregation would like to offer our prayers and deepest condolences to the Sutherland Springs community mourning the loss of their loved ones." On Sunday, Kelley began firing at the church shortly after the 11 a.m. service began, officials told The New York Times. He was armed with a Ruger military-style rifle and in his minutes-long assault on the church left everyone inside either dead or wounded. "I think nearly everyone had some type of injury," Wilson County Sheriff Joe Tackitt told reporters Monday, according to CNN. The victims of the shooting ranged in age from 5 to 72, and included a pregnant woman and the pastor's 14-year-old daughter. It was the deadliest mass shooting in Texas' history, Texas Governor Greg Abbott said, wiping out around four percent of the small Texas town's population. Freeman Martin, regional director for the Texas Department of Public Safety, said at a news conference that Kelley was shot at by a Sutherland Springs resident who lives near the church when he tried to flee the scene of the attack. He said the gunman dropped his rifle, ran to his car and sped away and was later found dead after a chase. Tackitt told CBS News in an interview on Monday morning that the gunman fatally shot himself after he crashed his car during the chase. "At this time we believe that he had a self-inflicted gunshot wound," Tackitt said. He noted as well that Kelley's in-laws sometimes attended First Baptist but they weren't in attendance on Sunday. "I heard that they attended church from time to time," Tackitt told Reuters. "Not on a regular basis." This article was originally published in The Christian Post. Welby offers prayers for British missionary killed in Nigeria The Archbishop of Canterbury has joined a public outpouring of sympathy after a British missionary died in Nigeria. Ian Squire, 56, was one of four aid workers kidnapped in the southern Delta state on October 13. Alongside David Donovan, a GP from Cambridge, Donovan's wife, Shirley and Alanna Carson, an optometrist from Leven, Fife, Squire, an optician, was working with the Christian health charity New Foundations. The circumstances around Squire's death are unclear. A Foreign Office spokesman said he was 'tragically killed' while the others returned safely to the UK. 'This has clearly been a traumatic time for all concerned, and our staff will continue to do all we can to support the families. We are grateful to the Nigerian authorities, and are unable to comment given the ongoing nature of their investigations,' a statement read. But reports from local media in Nigeria suggest Squire died of an asthma attack. A security source told Punch, a Nigerian newspaper: 'Unfortunately, one of the male victims who is asthmatic and diabetic, died while in captivity as a result of complications from his ailments.' It is thought after Squire's death, the kidnappers panicked and dropped the other three hostages off in a village in Bayelsa state, near the area where they had originally been taken. Justin Welby said his 'thoughts and prayers' were with Squire's family. 'We pray for the areas in the Niger Delta area of Nigeria where there are high levels of crime and tension for peace, restoration and reconciliation and God's kingdom to come in those communities and across all of Africa,' he wrote on his Facebook. In a statement following their release, the families of the hostages said: 'Alanna, Ian, David and Shirley were kidnapped in Nigeria some three weeks ago. 'We are grateful for the support received by the British High Commission, and help from the Nigerian authorities in negotiating their release. We are delighted and relieved that Alanna, David and Shirley have returned home safely. Our thoughts are now with the family and friends of Ian as we come to terms with his sad death. 'This has been a traumatic time for our loved ones who were kidnapped and for their families and friends here in the UK. We would therefore ask that the media respect our privacy as we come to terms with the news. We will not be making any further comment.' The reopening last week of the Canadian province of Ontarios Human Capital Priorities immigration stream allowed certain candidates in the Express Entry pool to benefit from one of Canadas most popular Provincial Nominee Program (PNP) streams. Even though Ontario stopped receiving applications through this stream just a few days later, the good news is that the province may invite even more applications before the end of year. Moreover, the province has confirmed that if an application is approved after the Ontario Immigrant Nominee Program (OINP) annual allotment is filled, the successful applicant will be issued a nomination certificate in 2018, when the provinces new allotment is assigned. The Human Capital Priorities stream is part of the OINP and allows the province to identify eligible candidates in the Express Entry pool who meet specific criteria, including a requirement to have a Comprehensive Ranking System (CRS) score of at least 400 points. Candidates identified through the Human Capital Priorities stream receive a Notification of Interest (NOI) from Ontario and are invited to apply for a provincial nomination certificate. Successful applicants receive an additional 600 points toward their Express Entry CRS score, followed by an Invitation to Apply (ITA) for Canadian permanent residence in a subsequent draw from the Express Entry pool. The Human Capital Priorities stream has been opened to applicants on a number of occasions through 2017. Indeed, on one occasion last June Ontario made the strategic decision to waive the requirement for potential applicants to have at least 400 CRS points. The province made this move as it searched for otherwise eligible candidates with work experience in specific Information and Communications Technology occupations, a move it may well make again in the future, either for those occupations or another list of occupations. OINP sources told CICNews when the Human Capital Priorities stream reopened last week that Ontarios annual allocation has not yet been filled, and more NOIs may be issued before the year is out. Thats potentially good news for eligible Express Entry candidates who are hoping to settle in Ontario, which is Canadas most populous province and includes both the countrys largest city, Toronto, as well as Ottawa, the national capital. The province was the destination of choice for more than 39 per cent of recent immigrants to Canada, many of whom are drawn by Ontarios strong manufacturing, financial, and science and technology sectors. The Human Capital Priorities stream is one of Ontarios three enhanced PNP streams, meaning they are aligned with Canadas Express Entry system. Ontario also offers a French-Speaking Skilled Worker stream, as well as a recently-launched Skilled Trades stream, both of which are enhanced. Most Canadian provinces and territories have at least one enhanced stream, which help to meet provincial labour market needs and are often a fast-track to Canadian permanent residence. A new enhanced PNP stream for Alberta, Canadas fourth most populous province and the countrys largest producer of oil and gas, is scheduled to be launched in January, 2018. Enhanced PNPs are playing an increasingly important role in Canadas economic immigration system. According to Immigration, Refugee and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), the share of Express Entry candidates issued an ITA who had obtained a provincial nomination certificate through an enhanced PNP stream rose to 26 per cent of all invited candidates in 2016, up from 13 per cent in 2015. Nearly half of all candidates who uploaded a provincial nomination to their profile in 2016 did so in the final quarter of the year. Ontario is not the only province to welcome new applications from Express Entry candidates over recent weeks. Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia have also opened their popular Express Entry-aligned streams, with both provinces offering first-come, first-served Express Entry streams in which candidates with work experience in an in-demand occupation may apply without a job offer. Over the course of 2017, British Columbia has also engaged with Express Entry under its own unique points system by inviting some candidates who have registered in BCs unique system to apply for an enhanced provincial nomination. Other provinces, including the Atlantic provinces of Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick, and Newfoundland, have also continued to leverage Express Entry into their PNPs throughout the year. Looking ahead to 2018, provinces looking to welcome newcomers stand to gain from Canadas new multi-year immigration strategy, which was announced November 1. Whereas the 2017 target for PNPs was 51,000, the 2018 target stands at 55,000, with further increases to 61,000 and 67,800 for 2019 and 2020, respectively an increase of 33 per cent between 2017 and 2020. To find out if you are eligible to enter the Express Entry pool, the first step to immigrating to Canada through many PNP streams, please fill out a free online assessment. 2017 CICNews All Rights Reserved Increased Family Class Immigration Targets Follow Other Government Initiatives Hugo O'Doherty Aa Accessibility Font Style Serif Sans Font Size A A When Canadas Minister of Immigration Ahmed Hussen stood before the gathered press in Toronto last week to reveal and explain the governments new multi-year immigration plan, he was keen to point out that the majority of the nearly one million permanent residents to be admitted to Canada over the next three years would be economic migrants. The next largest broad category, however, will be newcomers who arrive under the Family Class programs. It has been two years now since the governing Liberal Party won office in Ottawa from the Conservatives, and nearly a year since Hussen took over as head of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship (IRCC) from his predecessor, John McCallum. The strategy to grow the intake of Family Class immigrants may be seen as the latest in a succession of developments put in place over the last two years to make the process of sponsoring a loved one, or being sponsored, simpler than before. All in all, the outlook for Family Class applicants looks positive. Under this broad Canadian immigration category, citizens and permanent residents of Canada may sponsor their foreign spouse, common-law partner, dependent child(ren), parent(s), or grandparent(s). Over the next three years, Canada intends to welcome around 265,500 such persons as new permanent residents, to unite them with their family members in Canada. Processing times down In a news release last week, IRCC stated that this increased target intake will create the space needed to reduce backlogs and decrease processing times for families sponsoring spouses, children, parents, and grandparents. This projection ties in with the governments goal to reduce processing times, with a particular effort for spouses and common-law partners being sponsored while residing in Canada. In December, 2016, and to much media attention, then-Minister of Immigration McCallum announced that processing times for Inland sponsorship would be halved, from 24 months to 12 months. As of today, this target is being met in the majority of cases. Extension of work permit pilot program Not only can sponsored spouses and common-law partners enjoy quicker processing, but the government has ensured that they have the opportunity to work while awaiting a decision on the application. An open work permit pilot program, first introduced by the Conservative government in 2014, was subsequently extended by the Liberals in both 2015 and 2016. The extension of this popular pilot program has meant that many sponsored persons residing in Canada can sustain themselves and their families economically while their application for permanent residence works its way through the system. Work permit holders can remain engaged with the Canadian labour market, rather than having to wait, a factor that may also benefit their career prospects over the long term. Conditional PR provision removed Another move that makes settlement in Canada easier for some sponsored newcomers took place last April, when the government removed what was known as conditional permanent residence. Under this government policy, brought in by the Conservatives in 2012, sponsored spouses and common-law partners had to live with their sponsors for at least two years upon admission to Canada as a permanent resident if, at the time they applied, the relationship had begun less than two years previously and the couple had no children in common. The provision had been introduced as a means to deter people from seeking to immigrate to Canada through non-genuine relationships. However, by 2017 the Liberals had resolved that while cases of marriage or relationship fraud exist, the majority of relationships are genuine and most sponsorship applications are made in good faith. An additional concern that led to the removal of the provision was that vulnerable sponsored spouses or partners may have stayed in abusive relationships because they are afraid of losing their permanent resident status, even though an exception to the condition existed for those types of situations. Definition of dependent child changed For Canadian immigration purposes, between August, 2014 and October, 2017 an individual applying for permanent residence could include dependent children under 19 years of age on their application. Leading up to the 2015 federal election, the Liberal manifesto stated that increasing the age definition of dependency for immigration to under 22 years of age would be a priority. This change finally came into effect on October 24, 2017. While not strictly concerned only with the Family Class programs, this important change nonetheless affects all Canadian immigration categories, including the Family Class. Canadian citizens and permanent residents with eligible dependents abroad, who may not necessarily have been eligible before the change, may now be able to sponsor those family members for immigration to Canada. Higher PGP intake, new process The Parent and Grandparent Program (PGP) is part of the Family Class category. Through the PGP, Canadian citizens and permanent residents may sponsor foreign parents and grandparents to immigrate to Canada as permanent residents. The final PGP application intake cycle under the Conservatives took place in early 2015 and allowed for 5,000 applications to be accepted for processing. At that time, the program operated on a first-come, first-served basis, a process that the Liberals continued into 2016. However, the new government doubled the intake to 10,000 applications. Then for 2017 a new application process was revealed, whereby potential sponsors first declared their interest in the program before the government selected at random those who could go on to submit an application. Later in the year, the government issued more invitations to apply for the PGP, in line with the target intake for the year. Under the governments new multi-year immigration plan, there is to be a gradual, steady increase in the number of admissions under the PGP so that by 2020, around 21,000 new permanent residents will be admitted through the program. This will allow IRCC to whittle down the backlog of submitted applications awaiting processing, while also providing scope for new applications to be submitted in future application cycles. To find out your options to sponsor a family member or be sponsored under the Family Class Canadian immigration programs, fill out a free online assessment form. 2017 CICNews All Rights Reserved Terrorist Sayfullo Saipov told investigators that he chose to attack Lower Manhattan on Halloween because he knew that the streets there would be crowded. His assault, the first lethal terrorist attack on New York since September 11, 2001, killed eight people and injured 13 others precisely because Saipov was correct: an area of New York that, in the days after 9/11, was desolate save for the rescue workers toiling there was remarkably alive again on Halloween 2017making it a target of opportunity once more. To those who were in Manhattan on that grim day 16 years ago and who walked the citys streets regularly in the months following the 9/11 attacks, it was never certain that that would be the case. The brave talk back then of how resilient New York would be was counterbalanced by defeatism that preached capitulation to the terrorists deadly, anti-Western vision. That Lower Manhattan is more robust today than before the 911 attacks is testament to the irrepressible spirit of ordinary people, who brushed aside fear, gloomy predictions about New Yorks future, and bureaucratic efforts to strangle redevelopment in Lower Manhattan to create an entirely new neighborhood. Though it was once New Yorks central business district, Lower Manhattan was already in decline in the 1960s, when the head of Chase Manhattan Bank, David Rockefeller, convinced his brother Nelson, then governor of New York, to build a government-subsidized office complex in the area. The Rockefellers hoped that the massive World Trade Center would reignite interest in the neighborhood, even as local corporations were fleeing uptown to mid-Manhattan or leaving town entirely for friendlier tax and business climates. Instead, the giant Twin Towers project dumped some 10 million square feet of office space on New York just as the citys fiscal crisis exploded in the early 1970s and its crime rate skyrocketed. The glut of space plagued the Manhattan office market for years and did little to help the flagging area. Lower Manhattans real turnaround began in the mid-1990s, when then-mayor Rudy Giuliani used tax incentives to lure new companies, especially tech firms, to the area, and the city let developers recast aging office buildings as residential towers. As crime receded and New Yorks population burgeoned, Lower Manhattan became the anchor of Silicon Alley, a business community bolstered by a New York tech industry that employed some 138,000 people by 2000. The areas resurgence was so robust that then-governor George Pataki managed to get the Twin Towers out of the hands of government and into private ownership, with a 99-year lease that turned over management of the World Trade Center to developer Larry Silverstein. The downtown momentum ground to a halt after 9/11. The attacks on the towers represented the second time in nine years that terrorists had struck the complex, part of a long history of terrorism against the financial district dating back to a bomb explosion on September 16, 1920, in front of J.P. Morgan & Co, killing dozens. After 9/11, businesses fled the area quickly in just three months, vacancies surged by 50 percent as businesses headed to midtown, New Jersey, and beyond. Though the assault destroyed 13.5 million square feet of office space, by the end of 2001, there was more empty real estate in still-standing office towers in Lower Manhattan than there had been before the attacks. Worse, petty turf battles broke out among politicians over who would direct downtown redevelopment. The task didnt get easier when Pataki handed rebuilding authority to the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation. Under the LMDCs guidance, rebuilding increasingly came under the influence of anti-business, anti-development advocacy groups, partnering with 9/11 victims families to argue that little or no commerce should return to the site. With town hall meetings soliciting input from groups like the Natural Resources Defense Council and the National Organization of Women Legal and Educational Defense Fund, reconstruction planning descended into an exercise in anguish and sentimentality, with grief counselors on hand in case talk of rebuilding the city prove too stressful for anyone. The result: an effort to tilt the future of Lower Manhattan toward cultural uses, and a giant memorial aimed at making the area a tourist attractiona Disneyland of Death, as I described it in the Wall Street Journal. Meantime, however, the area beyond Ground Zero spontaneously took a different course. Silverstein, who lost not only the Towers but also a separate building, 7 World Trade, that was not part of Ground Zero, quickly rebuilt that tower and started leasing it. I simply did not listen to all the naysayers because I was spending my money, not theirs, and fortunately I had no government involvement, he told me. His vision of a more robust, commercially driven reconstruction gradually won out, in part because while he fought with the government over the direction of the WTC site, outside of Ground Zero, Lower Manhattan continued to transform rapidly into a 24-hour community. Between 2000 and 2014, Lower Manhattan, once largely a business district, saw its residential population double to about 50,000, as New Yorkers thumbed their noses at the fear of future attacks. The transformation continues today, with more than 30 additional residential buildings under construction or recently completed. And even with the slow pace of reconstruction at Ground Zero, the area ultimately regained the private employment that it had lost, thanks to jobs at businesses that didnt previously operate in Lower Manhattanincluding more than a dozen new hotels. Today, Lower Manhattan is abuzz in a way that seemed difficult to imagine after 9/11. In addition to all the new residents, about 275,000 people work there, and 13 million people visit the area every year. Some of that activity is no doubt a result of the excellent work done by the NYPD and state and federal agencies in short-circuiting about 25 plots aimed at the city since 2001. Some is also a result of the continuing appeal of a city whose population continues to grow in the wake of an historic, 25-year decline in crime that has made New York one of Americas safest cities. Saipov saw the unmistakable signs of life in Lower Manhattan. To him, it was an opportunity for mayhem. Fortunately, for many more people, it represents just plain, old-fashioned opportunity. Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images We are delighted to announce the return of Fundraising Live- the event specifically designed to give fundraisers a voice on the things that really matter. As we embark on a new era in fundraising, innovation, collaboration and digital engagement are more relevant than ever. Such a shift creates opportunities, but also challenges. From navigating income date regulation right through to operating in an unstable economic and political climate, charities are under pressure to retain the human touch while also effectively embracing the pace of change. This year's programme showcases some of the exciting developments and new trends emerging across the sector in response to such challenges. It features some of the most disruptive strategies from organisations of varying shapes and sizes, including examples of small organisations forging beneficial partnerships and new engagement methods such as the rise of virtual reality. No matter how worthy your cause, if you dont get your tone, brand and messaging right with your donor communications you are unlikely to stand still, let alone see a growth in your income streams. In the increasingly digital, social-media-driven world of nonsense and clutter we now live in, not a day goes by without someone tugging on your heartstrings and asking you for their support. So, how can your branding make you stand out from the noise of other fundraising charities? How can your charitys brand help you capture hearts and minds and grow income? Conservative and Labour MPs yesterday raised concerns about the government's approach to addressing pay owed to sleep-in shift workers. Labours shadow business secretary, Rebecca Long-Bailey, called on the government to help fund disability charities estimated up to 400m back-pay bill in its upcoming Budget. Speaking in the House of Commons yesterday during buisness minister's question time, Long-Bailey criticised the governments scheme to tackle the issue, which it launched last week, saying it fails to address providers funding issues. The governments voluntary Social Care Compliance Scheme, which has been criticised by charities and other sectors, requires organisations to assess their own back-pay liability and repay sleep-in shift workers who have historically been paid below the minimum wage by March 2019. Long-Bailey said this scheme does not address the fact that many providers simply cannot afford to pay due to funding cuts, and some workers will not be paid what they are duly owed until 31 March 2019. She quoted concerns from some in the sector including Mencap, which said that smaller providers would be reluctant to take part in the scheme for fear that they would be writing their own suicide note. Therefore, I ask the secretary of state: will the government commit the necessary funding in the Budget to avert a crisis in the care sector, which could see many businesses struggle to survive, impacting on already fragile care services, and leave thousands of care staff without the wages they are owed? she said. Govt. must avert a crisis in the care sector, and provide necessary funding to deal with the "inadequate" social care back payments scheme pic.twitter.com/RMA8EVpyHx Rebecca Long-Bailey (@RLong_Bailey) 7 November 2017 In response, business secretary Greg Clark said it was a difficult and complex issue. He said: We completely accept the need for confidence among the providers of care to some of the most vulnerable people in society, while recognising the legitimate claim, which has been upheld by the courts, of those who have worked in that sector. Bringing those two things together requires precision and care, so that this is robust and does not create further uncertainty if it were found not to be legally possible to advance it. That is why the interim proposal has been made. Conservative MPs voice concerns In an earlier debate about social care in the Commons yesterday, some Conservative MPs also voiced their concerns about the governments scheme. Peter Aldous, MP for Waveney, said: The governments new interim compliance scheme, announced last week, unfortunately adds to the uncertainty facing the social care sector. May I urge the minister to do all she can to ensure that, as quickly as possible, the government get back round the table with the sector to find an acceptable long-term solution? Kevin Hollinrake also voiced concerns and suggested that the government should revisit the legislation. In response, business minister Margot James said: We are working very hard across government with the Department of Health and the Department for Communities and Local Government to continue our discussions with the Treasury about possible solutions to the long-term viability of certain providers. 'Difficult and complex issue' On Twitter, Learning Disability Voices, a charity membership body, said Clarks comments showed the complexities that government properly funding social care sector would solve. We agree that carers deserve the back-pay they are owed. Our concern is affording the unplanned-for bill and protecting future of the care sector, it said. Response to @RLong_Bailey from @GregClarkMP cites complexities that Gov properly funding social care sector would solve. #StopSleepInCrisis LDV (@LDVoices) 7 November 2017 There is no space for new legislation for a legal definition of full-time volunteering this side of Brexit, Lord Gus ODonnell said at an event on volunteering held last night. Speaking in response to James Probert, who was discussing the need for a legal definition of full-time volunteering on behalf of volunteering charity City Year, Lord Gus ODonnell said that there is not space in the legislative timetable for any new primary legislation. City Year is leading a campaign for primary legislation to give full-time volunteers a legal status. Currently full-time volunteers fall into the Not in Education, Employment or Training category. City Years chief executive explained the reasons for doing so in a Civil Society Voices post here. ODonnell was speaking at an event of celebrating Pro Bon Economics Volunteering. He was directing his comments to David Rossington, finance director of the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. He said: In a world where my lot are going to make life incredibly difficult for the government over the next few months to a year getting the legislation required for Brexit through, there is no space for any legislation. You are not going to get any legislation. So A, are you going to find a way to chisel this out? Or B, is there a way that this can go ahead without primary legislation for now? City Year will wait for primary legislation In response, Rossington said: You are absolutely right, the legislative timetable is chock a block, for exactly the reason you suggest. But that doesnt completely rule out things like private members bills, there is that option. He said that Probert should look at what a report, due to be published shortly into what the legal-definition of full-time volunteering could mean, does to distinguish between what can only be achieved through primary legislation, and what can be achieved without that for a period of time. However Probert said that City Year would wait for a legal definition of volunteering, and that there was an immeasurable importance of status of full-time volunteers, which was more important than any economic considerations. He continued: A technocratic fix that mends loopholes using administrative orders behind the scenes doesnt give a respected status to people doing full-time volunteering. This requires primary legislation. And we will wait, this isnt a one or two year gain Britain needs this, and we will need it in 2022 as well. Or whenever Brexit is over. Britain lacks the vocabulary for volunteering The event focused around a speech from Probert, as well as from Vidhya Alakeson, chief executive of Power to Change, which were then followed by questions from the panel. The panel included Rossington, as well as Bronwyn Curtis from JP Morgan and Peter Kellner, chair of NCVO. It was chaired by Lord ODonnell who is chair of Pro Bono Economics. Curtis questioned Probert on the use of the words national service as a description of what City Year wants to achieve, its one year volunteering programme, as it is not compulsory and brings about negative connotations. Probert said that the programme could be described as national service for the 21st century, not for the 1950s, but said that at this moment in time its priority was not what it is called but on gaining the attention of the public and mainstream media on the drive to create the one-year volunteering programme. On advice from a member of the audience on abandoning the use of the word volunteering, Probert said: The reason I use the word service is that we lack the vocabulary at the moment in the UK to properly differentiate between different kinds of volunteering. Full-time volunteering is qualitatively not just quantitatively different from part-time volunteering. It is not helpful to compare the two actually. They will do different things, they will get involved in different things. Civil society should organise itself Rossington also said that the government should not get too involved in running civil society, and that to do so would be counterproductive. He said: I think that actually government cant do everything, and government shouldnt be organising what we call civil society, which I think is what we call the space between businesses, government and family life. That should organise itself. Although government can do a couple of things. The first thing is it can either make things very difficult or it can encourage civil society, and I think that is where there is a role in setting frameworks. Thinking that government can somehow step in and run civil society is completely wrong and probably counter-productive as well. First, the dream was to keep Baltimore City Paper alive. That didnt work. Now, the dream is to start something completely newa weekly newspaper and website with leadership that represents the majority-black city it serves; smart, inclusive news and culture coverage; and a business structure that prioritizes collaboration over competition. The experiment goes public on November 15, when the first issue of Baltimore Beat hits the city. The idea was born after City Paper Editor in Chief Brandon Soderberg posted a July story announcing that the 40-year-old alt-weekly was being closed by its owner, the Baltimore Sun Media Group, which is owned by Tronc. Staff learned the news a few weeks after it voted to unionizein fact, owners said they would recognize the union at the same meeting where staffers were told the paper would shut down. But they would keep publishing into fall. Its unusual for an owner to keep a news outlet going for several months after announcing its closure. This gave Soderberg an opportunity to campaign for its survival. TRENDING: He picked his own middle name at the age of 8 after reading The Chronicles of Narnia In his July post, Soderberg appealed for a buyer to save City Paper. Among the many people who replied was Kevin Naff, a Baltimore resident and co-owner of the media company that publishes the Washington Blade, an LGBT weekly with a reputation for strong journalism. Naff, a former Sun staffer who helped launch its website in 1996, said that conversations about purchasing the alt-weekly didnt pan out, and the Baltimore Sun Media Group rejected his offer of a licensing deal that would give him the right to use the name. No matter. Market research led Naff to believe it was better to start fresh anyway. Thats what his company did in March when it launched the Los Angeles Blade, another LGBT publication. With the back-office services that owners Brown, Naff, Pitts Omnimedia, Inc. already had in place with its sister publication in Washingtonaccounting, billing, and so onthe Los Angeles Blade just needed editorial and sales staff to launch. Its been a success, which Naff attributes to two things: LAs hunger for real reporting on the LGBT community, rather than just fluff on bars and nightlife, and a post-election awakening to the critical role that journalists play in a democratic society. This is more or less the plan to bring the Baltimore Beat to life on a swift timeline. Its first issue will be released just two weeks after City Paper published its last issue on November 1. But with the Washington Blade published just 40 miles away, it has the advantage of the companys pre-existing deals for distribution and printing. Sign up for weekly emails from the United States Project And there was never a question about publishing a print issue. As anybody in the industry knows, thats still where most of the money is, Naff says. ICYMI: Former NYTimes journalists are ticked off by new Meryl Streep, Tom Hanks movie Its also about reader access and inclusion. Two staff members told me that about a quarter of the citys population doesnt have regular access to the internet. (While CJR couldnt find a study that says exactly this, Baltimores digital divide was a major issue for its former mayor.) As Lisa Snowden-McCray, the Beats editor in chief, describes it, a physical paper is accessible to anyone who stumbles across it in a bar, or while waiting for the bus, or in a library, so youre hitting a lot of different people. Soderberg, who will be the Beats managing editor and news editor, also said the paper plans to distribute further and deeper into Baltimore than City Paper, which was concentrated in the center of the city. Good morning! Editor @LisaMcCray talked to @baynardwoods about the new paper and collaborating. https://t.co/Z54PZU2w7g Baltimore Beat (@baltbeat) November 3, 2017 The Beat also stands out as a publication with an African-American woman as editor in chief. Snowden-McCray is a City Paper veteran who took a job on the editorial board at the Sun in August. She left at the end of October to lead the Beat. My stomach still really hurts, Snowden-McCray says. I was stressed about the decision. The people at the Sun are great, I had a stable job, I have kidsbut I also knew this was an opportunity to do a lot of the things Ive been talking about for years when it comes to journalism and the need for more voices in it. Growing up in Maryland, I didnt see what a black woman journalist looks like, she adds. Even now, I cant see many black women in editorial positions, let alone as editor in chief. Occupying that space is important. RELATED: Stakes mount for alt-weeklies as City Paper faces the reaper The need is especially acute in a city that is nearly 65-percent African-American. Snowden-McCray envisions the Beat as a publication for people whose perspectives havent always been heardnot just in hard news, but also in, for example, food coverage. Writing about food can be a very white thing, she said. Well-reviewed restaurants are sometimes the same places where she, her husband, and others are treated poorly because of their race, but that never gets talked about in the media. Overjoyed w/ news of @baltbeat, run by @LisaMcCray & @notrivia, both deeply committed to elevating Baltimore voices https://t.co/OoI6frJDe8 Writers in BMore (@WritersinBMore) November 3, 2017 The Beat has five full-time staff members, plus Naff as the publisher, and it hopes to grow more. Its also relying on collaboration for its success. Its partnering with The Real News Network, a 10-year-old nonprofit video news service. While RNN focuses on national and international news, it has a Baltimore bureau, a pilot project for local news coverage, and it has an ally in senior reporter Baynard Woods, another City Paper veteran (and one who wrote for CJR about its closure). RNN houses the Beat in its downtown office on Holiday Street, and it will also license some of its local news coverage to the alt-weekly, giving it a boost in audio and video. The Beat and the Blade papers may also cross-publish stories; the Washington Blade already has a history of reporting on Baltimores LGBT community. And Woods envisions partnerships that would make the Beat a multi-lingual paperstories translated into Spanish, perhaps, or maybe a column in Korean, both of which would extend the papers reach into Baltimores diverse communities. I was stressed about the decision. The people at the Sun are great, I had a stable job, I have kidsbut I also knew this was an opportunity to do a lot of the things Ive been talking about for years when it comes to journalism and the need for more voices in it. The news about the shuttering of City Paper coincided with the end of The Marc Steiner Show, a progressive talk show on the public radio station WEAA. That prompted Soderberg, Woods, and Steiner to create the Baltimore Institute for Nonprofit Journalism as a guerilla newsroomdonated funds would pay freelancers for local reporting projects that would then be freely given to news outlets. Modeled on the Boston Institute for Nonprofit Journalism, and even sharing a logo (with permission), Woods says BINJ will soon start a second round of fundraising, including a Patreon page, to help it fund beats, especially a gun beat, where a reporter would focus on gun violence in the city. Some of the reporting BINJ supports will go to the Beat and the Real News Network, but it will also be distributed to any small organization in town, really, Woods says. Anywhere not owned by Tronc or the alt-right. The Baltimore Beat, then, is definitely not City Paper under a new name, as Naff puts it. Snowden-McCray agrees. City Paper is dead and gone. There are similar things that unite all alt-weeklies. We create space to talk more about art, literature, and music, to do really deep-dive longread journalism. That will still be there. But I think what we really want is to make this a better reflection of the community. ICYMI: The decimation of local news in New York City Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today Anna Clark is a journalist in Detroit. Her writing has appeared in ELLE Magazine, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Next City, and other publications. Anna edited A Detroit Anthology, a Michigan Notable Book, and she was a 2017 Knight-Wallace journalism fellow at the University of Michigan. She is the author of The Poisoned City: Flints Water and the American Urban Tragedy, published by Metropolitan Books, an imprint of Henry Holt. She is online at www.annaclark.net and on Twitter @annaleighclark. One year later, CNNs John King was back at his electoral map, The New York Timess prediction meter was ticking away, and pundits were poring over exit polling data. Exactly 364 days after Donald Trump won a stunning victory, the hallmarks of election night in America were back, if on a much smaller scale. The results, as youve likely heard by now, represent a revitalization of the Democratic party and a stinging rebuke of the Trump presidency to date. Ralph Northam outperformed his polls in the closely-watched Virginia governors race, Danica Roem became the first openly transgender person elected to a state legislature by defeating Virginias homophobe in chief, and Democrats picked up victories in several contested mayoral races around the country. Expect last nights results to shift the narrative as journalists project what lies ahead across the political landscape. ICYMI: A recent op-ed made a very important point about the word collusion The anniversary of one of the most shocking results in American political history has also provided outlets with an opportunity to look back at how we got here. Esquire kicked things off with a great oral history of the untold stories of election day 2016, while Slate has an innovative chronicle of the year in push alerts. After the failure to foresee Trumps election, journalists across the industry questioned their processes and vowed to do better. Explorations of Trump country, debates over fake news and threats to the press, and conversations about collective blind spots (as well as dozens of panels covering all of the above) soon followed. A year in, The Washington Posts Margaret Sullivan takes stock of the medias progress and finds it lacking. The scoops have been relentless, the digging intense, the results important, she writes. But in another crucial way, the reality-based press has failed. Too often, it has succumbed to the chaos of covering Trump, who lies and blusters and distracts at every turn. TRENDING: New York Times makes important statement about mass shootings with a series of clocks Sign up for CJR 's daily email The volume of information, both important and trivial, emanating from the nations capital is difficult to process even for those of us whose jobs require constant attention to the news. For Americans just trying to keep up, its overwhelming. Sullivan argues that great reporting has too often been drowned out by shiny-object journalism. The result is that citizens are left with a confusing, chaotic pictureone that many doubt is true, and many others have decided to block out. That isnt good enough. Below, more on the results of last night and the events of the past year. Other notable stories Has America ever needed a media watchdog more than now? Help us by joining CJR today Pete Vernon is a former CJR staff writer. Follow him on Twitter @ByPeteVernon. The family of a woman killed in a 2010 crash involving a Melrose Place actress will receive a $4.8 million settlement. A jury convicted Amy Locane-Bovenizer in 2012 for the crash that killed 60-year-old Helene Seeman in Somerset County, N.J., in 2010. Seemans husband sued Locane-Bovenizer in federal court in December 2010 and the case was stayed pending resolution of the state criminal trial. NJ.com reports most of the money will come from the hosts of a party where actress Amy Locane-Bovenizer was drinking before the crash. Rachel and Carlos Sagebien agreed to pay $3.3 million through their insurance company to the family of Helene Seeman. Locane-Bovenizer and her estranged husband will pay $1.5 million. Prosecutors say Locane-Bovenizer was driving with a blood-alcohol level nearly three times the legal limit when her SUV slammed into a Mercury Milan driven by Fred Seeman as he was turning into his driveway. The actress served about 2 and a 1/2 years in prison after being convicted of vehicular manslaughter and other charges. In a resentencing hearing, a judge said he erred by imposing too light a sentence, but declined to send Locane-Bovenizer back to prison. The state has appealed that decision. The Montgomery Township crash also injured Seemans husband, Fred. Locane-Bovenizer appeared in 13 episodes of TVs Melrose Place and in movies including Cry-Baby, School Ties and Secretary. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Although retail sales of recreational marijuana can begin in July, many customers across northern Massachusetts may have to travel significant distances or wait several months to acquire the substance. Moratoriums are becoming widespread, with many towns opting to block any recreational marijuana businesses into late 2018 as a way to buy time for developing zoning and regulation plans. Some, as allowed under the state law legalizing the drug, have opted instead for outright, permanent bans on the businesses. As a result, only a handful of towns in northern Massachusetts will be able to join the initial wave of recreational sales, a trend that legal marijuana advocates say could have lasting economic repercussions. Last November, voters across the state approved Question 4, legalizing recreational marijuana, before the Legislature approved some changes regarding local control to the law. The state Cannabis Control Commission is expected to issue regulations in March and allow sales to begin in July. However, a review of 39 municipalities around Lowell and Fitchburg found that large portions of the area will not be ready or willing to allow sales to begin next summer. Roughly a third of towns examined have enacted moratoriums through November or December 2018, most of which have been approved at Town Meetings in recent weeks. Several other towns will vote on similar policies in the coming weeks, while half a dozen more have moratoriums into the middle of 2018. At least nine area towns have banned recreational marijuana businesses. Local officials argue that these policies are an important way for towns and cities to govern. Many that have enacted moratoriums supported Question 4, and leaders in those communities say the delays give sufficient time to draft regulations after the Commissions recommendations come out next spring. We would freeze everything, and make those decisions over the next year, Billerica Town Manager John Curran said at an October Town Meeting that approved a moratorium. It makes all the sense in the world to do. A representative for the Commission could not be reached to provide further details on what the regulations will contain. However, Jim Borghesani, a spokesman for the Yes on 4 Coalition, said he believes the states recommendations next spring will not have a significant impact on local zoning policies. He argued that moratoriums have negative consequences. Itll do two things: itll keep the criminal market in control of marijuana sales, and second, itll make these towns have much more difficulty in getting new taxpaying businesses and new jobs, Borghesani said. Likely, industry members wont move into a town that has already taken an adverse action on cannabis sales. Only six communities that currently have no moratorium or ban in place: Lowell, Ayer, Fitchburg, Harvard, Leominster and Pepperell. Those municipalities are scattered across the region, but residents in Wilmington or Dunstable, for example, may face a substantial drive to access a shop. We dont want to see islands of cannabis availability, Borghesani said. We want consumers to get legal cannabis fairly close to where they live. That will make it much easier for them to access legal cannabis and it will drive the criminal market out of business. At least Lowell and Ayer have begun the process that could lead to sales soon. Lowell city planners have begun drafting ordinances and zoning policies to govern potential dispensaries, which can begin applying for permits now. Ayer has a prospective candidate: Central Avenue Compassionate Care, operating since 2015. The companys leadership has publicly expressed interest in opening a separate recreational shop. Town Administrator Robert Pontbriand said the dispensarys interest created a unique situation: A ban or moratorium on retail sales would not have prevented CACC from seeking a recreational permit, and selectmen felt that taking no action at all ahead of the summer would create a free for all in town. So Ayer, which approved Question 4 with 57 percent support, instead steered into the interest, allowing CACC and any other interested companies to apply. To retain some control, Town Meeting approved zoning changes that allow only one recreational license. That policy will go into effect if also approved at a Nov. 28 special town referendum. Pontbriand said zoning would balance opportunity with caution, allowing Ayer to reap the economic benefits municipalities can collect a 3 percent tax on recreational sales, and given the lack of businesses in other communities, Ayer is sure to attract wide interest while still enforcing some limitations. I believe that the town is trying to move forward in a proactive way based on the reality that recreational marijuana is going to be legal in Massachusetts, Pontbriand said. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. When disaster strikes, houses of worship are often on the front lines, feeding and sheltering victims. Yet churches, synagogues and mosques are routinely denied aid by the Federal Emergency Management Agency when it comes time to repair or rebuild their damaged sanctuaries. Pressure is mounting to change that after this years series of devastating hurricanes damaged scores of churches in Texas, Florida and Puerto Rico. FEMA is rethinking its policies in the face of a federal lawsuit, scheduled for a hearing Tuesday, by three Texas churches hit by Hurricane Harvey. President Donald Trump has signaled his support, via Twitter, for the religious institutions. At the same time, several members of Congress have revived legislation first proposed after 2012s Hurricane Sandy that would force FEMA to pay for repairs at places of worship. The debate centers on two key questions: Does providing such aid violate the First Amendment separation of church and state? Or is it an infringement on the First Amendment right to free exercise of religion to deny churches the same aid available to numerous other nonprofit organizations, such as libraries, zoos and homeless shelters? It seems like the only reason churches are excluded is because theyre churches, and it just seems discriminatory to me, said Bruce Frazier, pastor of Rockport First Assembly of God Church, which is part of the lawsuit. Religious entities already can receive some government help in disasters. They can be reimbursed by local governments for sheltering evacuees and can receive U.S. Small Business Administration loans to repair their buildings. FEMA grants are available to religiously affiliated schools, health care providers and nursing homes. And FEMA also can provide money to repair church-run facilities that function like community centers, but only if less than half the space or use is for religious purposes. Over the past five years, FEMA has authorized a net of $113 million for about 500 religiously affiliated entities such as schools, medical clinics and community centers after hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and other disasters, according to an AP analysis of data made public as part of the lawsuit. But FEMA hasnt supplied money to repair sanctuaries, and its 50 percent rule excludes many other types of church facilities. It is the faith community that responds so robustly to the need. And then to say, Tough luck, were not going to help you put your own facility back together is wrong, said Rep. Christopher Smith, a New Jersey Republican sponsoring the bill that would change the policy. Not everyone shares that view, noting constitutional concerns. I really cant see anything more core and more of an establishment of religion than building a house of worship, said Maggie Garrett, a lawyer who has lobbied against FEMA aid to religious institutions on behalf of Americans United for Separation of Church and State. FEMA declined to comment, citing the lawsuit. But in a court filing, the U.S. Justice Department said the challenged policies are being reconsidered. High winds and flooding from Hurricane Katrina in 2005 damaged more than 1,000 buildings owned by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans. FEMA later came through with more than $300 million, an amount the archdioceses chief financial officer, Jeff Entwisle, described as extraordinary assistance. Even so, he estimated that FEMA deemed less than one-third of the buildings eligible for funding. The archdiocese opted not to rebuild nearly one-quarter of its churches and schools. When Hurricane Harvey slammed Texas in August, it blew down the steeple, ripped away the front doors and destroyed the roof of Fraziers church, causing extensive water damage. The church applied for FEMA disaster aid but was directed instead to private insurance coverage and the Small Business Administration for a loan. Frazier said the church of about 125 members couldnt afford wind-storm insurance and cant even afford the loan payments that would be necessary to fully rebuild. Were just asking to get help, Frazier said. I mean, were struggling. The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston and Congregation Torah Vachesed, a Houston-area synagogue flooded by Harvey, filed briefs in support of the churches that are suing. The synagogue asserted that the pernicious effect of FEMAs policy of explicit discrimination is to deter and discourage the exercise of the Jewish faith. The lawsuit contends hundreds of other places of worship also are being denied access to FEMA funding, but its hard to say how many would seek federal aid if given the opportunity or how much money is at stake. First Baptist Rockport Church, a mile from the First Assembly of God, sustained about $1 million in damage when Hurricane Harvey collapsed a choir room wall and caused leaks in the roof. Senior Pastor Scott Jones said he doesnt fault others who seek FEMA aid, but his church wont be doing so. We believed that God would provide for us another way, and that we were going to respect the separation of church and state, and not expect or count on help from the federal government, Jones said. Last June, the U.S. Supreme Court found that a Lutheran church in Columbia, Missouri, had been wrongly excluded from a state grant program to install a soft playground surface made of recycled tires. Chief Justice John Roberts called it odious to our Constitution to deny an otherwise eligible recipient solely because its a church. Richard W. Garnett, a University of Notre Dame law professor who runs the schools program on Church, State and Society, said that based on that ruling, there is a good chance the high court would allow FEMA to provide aid to rebuild places of worship. The purpose of the support would not be to subsidize religious worship but rather to clean up the community and help local institutions that themselves provide important relief services to those in need, Garnett said. (Associated Press Writer Ryan J. Foley in Iowa City, Iowa, contributed to this report.) Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. The aftermath of this years hurricanes includes massive reconstruction across the impacted areas, which in turn creates an increased possibility for construction defect claims that would affect the liability insurance market. When Hurricane Harvey swept over large portions of Texas, wind, rain and floods caused heavy damage to land, buildings and other improvements, and also to the inventory of lumber yards and other suppliers. Hurricane Irma then did much the same in Florida. Hurricanes Irma and Maria devastated Puerto Rico, which has additional challenges in getting ready to rebuild due to its island setting and financial situation. Louisiana and other states have also suffered, most recently from tropical storm Nate. Subsequent storm events across the southeastern United States are forecast. Texas and Florida already are among the nations leaders in new construction, consisting primarily of home building. Before this hurricane season, home construction in both states was already rebounding from the 2006-2008 slump and subsequent dips. In the one year period from June 2016 to June 2017, the Dallas-Fort Worth area had the most new single family homes under construction nationwide, followed by the Houston area in second place nationally. Adding more residences, some Texas developers began experimenting with single family communities for rentals rather than sales. North Texas last year was second after New York City in the construction of new apartments. Hurricane Harvey temporarily halted construction in the impacted areas of the state, but builders are getting back to work. Floridas increase in new construction is slower but remains steady, with residential construction far outstripping commercial and public projects. New construction inevitably leads to construction defect claims. The claim volume projected before the storms should now increase. Following the recent storms, developers may soon see suits which allege that existing property suffered additional damage during a hurricane due to poor construction or design. Moreover, partial reconstruction, extensive repair, and new construction to replace destroyed property seems likely to propagate yet more construction defect suits in the near and distant future. Most states allow a property owner from four to 10 years to discover a latent defect and make a claim for it, starting from when the work was completed or from when the property was thereafter first sold or certified fit for occupancy. In that context, the consequences of the 2017 hurricane season will likely be felt for at least another ten to fifteen years, if not longer, in the claims arena. Texas and Florida both have strong consumer protection laws, comparable to California, Arizona, and Nevada (other states with high home construction rates and periodic natural disasters that have resulted in mass claims against builders). They both have long-established Right to Repair Acts creating pre-litigation procedures for construction defect claims that have spawned litigation about the duties of an insurer to be involved during the pre-litigation stage. In Texas, the 1989 Residential Construction Liability Act (RCLA) encourages home builders and contractors to make repairs rather than contesting claims with mandatory pre-litigation procedures. It has been expanded and liberally interpreted over the years, backed by the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act. Texas courts find coverage for those repairs when interpreting the builders and contractors policies. Yet, to date, no Texas court has found a duty to defend the statutory pre-litigation procedure under typical comprehensive general liability (CGL) policies, creating the anomalous situation where the insurer is liable for claims it need not defend. Creating a further incentive to participate, the Texas Supreme Court in a 2013 decision, Lennar Corp. v. Markel Am. Ins. Co., found coverage under a CGL policy for a developers repair work on hundreds of homes pursuant to settlements under the RCLA based on a finding that the settlements, entered into without the insurers consent, did not prejudice the insurer and thus would not justify a denial of coverage under the standard policy condition that no insured will, except at that insureds own cost, voluntarily make a payment, assume any obligation, or incur any expense . . . without [the insurers] consent. Floridas 2003 Construction Defects statute establishes a pre-suit process for commercial and residential property. It has been repeatedly revised, most recently in 2015. The Florida pre-suit procedure extends the time to file a construction defect lawsuit. The statute requires a claimant to serve a notice of construction defects on the construction professional as a condition precedent to filing a lawsuit, and allows multiple, alternative responses to the notice, including an offer to make repairs and/or pay money that will not obligate the persons insurer and a statement that the amount of money will be determined by the persons insurer within 30 days, giving the insurer the option to respond if the claimant agrees to be bound by the insurers determination. If the claim is not settled, the claimant may file a lawsuit. The statute also states that providing a copy of a notice of construction defects to the recipients liability insurer shall not constitute a claim for insurance purposes unless the terms of the policy specify otherwise. The question whether a notice under the statute constitutes a suit triggering an insurers duty to defend is currently pending before the Florida Supreme Court in Altman Contractors, Inc. v. Crum & Forster Specialty Ins. Co. Historically, California, Arizona and Nevada have been the hotbeds for construction defect litigation. But, with the consumer friendly backdrop, and the increase in construction following the 2017 hurricane season, circumstances are ripe for Texas and Florida to become more like the Southwest states with respect to construction defect claims. Insurers would do well to start applying the lessons learned in the Southwest now. Claims in the Southwest have taught insurers how to manage high volumes of construction claims more effectively. As the cost of the hurricane driven claims is likely to increase, insurers will be even more motivated to streamline the claims process in search of efficiency, perhaps in part by the use of new technology. News sources repeatedly refer to a shortage of materials and labor in Texas and Florida before the hurricanes. The storms make makes both shortages worse by reducing the supply of material while raising the cost of bringing supplies into the area and also diverting labor. This is driving up the cost for labor and materials. When combined with already rising volume of construction, especially home construction, and strong impetus to get repairs done as quickly as possible, the cost of construction could further increase, which will further inflate the cost of construction defect cases to insurers. Insurers should also be prepared for insurance coverage disputes arising out of construction defect litigation. Floridas Civil Remedy statute codifies insurance claims handling standards in a statute which creates a direct right of action against insurers, one means of asserting a bad faith claim against an insurer. In 2003, Texas enacted what is known as the Prompt Payments Act, which awards 18 percent interest and attorney fees to an insured that shows unreasonable delay. This statute is part of extensive legislation adding various forms of consumer protection to the Texas Insurance Code, including typical standards for claims handling and duties to disclose claim information to the insured. Courts in both states have recognized causes of action for a range of insurer behavior that may give rise to extracontractual damages in addition to policy payments owed, separate from statutory claims. The consequences of any oversight or misstep in claims handling in these states (and others) can be costly and long lasting. The likely cascade of claims arising from these hurricanes will last a very long time. We encourage insurers in the construction market for the southeastern United States, and especially their local claim handlers, to be prepared for high volume and high costs in these challenging environments. Holly S. Harvey is a partner with Clyde & Co. Artificial intelligence appears set to revolutionize the air travel experience for passengers and that could happen in just a matter of years, according to industry experts. Airports around the world already employ advanced technology such as biometrics, which authenticates travelers' identities based on physical attributes like fingerprints. But the next decade or so could herald a new era for air travel, experts say. For one, security clearances as we know them could become a thing of the past. Travelers will no longer need to produce any identifying documents at airports, Paul Griffiths, CEO of Dubai Airports, told CNBC. "Most of the touch points that we currently loathe about airports today the security and immigration will disappear. And technology will enable all of those checks to be done in the background," said Griffiths. Those sophisticated verification systems will improve security while simultaneously reducing the intrusiveness of clearance procedures, the CEO said. Although the technology may sound futuristic, Griffiths said he was "absolutely" sure such an experience could be achieved in the next 10 to 20 years as all the devices that will enable it to function as a whole process already exists. The key lies in integrating current features which include facial recognition, retinal scanning, and fingerprint ID into a workable system, Griffiths explained. China's trade surplus with the U.S. fell to $26.62 billion in October from $28.08 billion in September, the Customs department reported on Wednesday ahead of President Donald Trump's visit to the country. China's trade surplus with the U.S. was $222.98 billion in the first 10 months of 2017, Customs added. The U.S. trade deficit with China is in focus as Trump travels to Beijing on Wednesday, where he will meet his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping. Overall, China's October exports lagged market expectations, rising 6.9 percent from a year earlier while imports beat forecasts, growing 17.2 percent, official data showed on Wednesday. That left the country with a trade surplus of $38.17 billion for the month, according to a Reuters calculation based on official data. Analysts polled by Reuters had expected October shipments from the world's largest exporter to have risen 7.2 percent, slower than 8.1 percent in the previous month. Imports had been expected to rise 16.0 percent, softening from an 18.7 percent gain seen in September. Analysts had forecast China's trade surplus to have widened to $39.5 billion in October from September's $28.61 billion. After several lean years, China's trade performance has rebounded this year thanks to strong demand at home and abroad. While exports are contributing to China's economic growth once again, global investors have been more focused on its strong appetite for industrial commodities such as iron ore and coal, which is boosting resources prices worldwide. CNBC contributed to this report. President Donald Trump , a famously picky eater, was served grilled Korean beef with 360 year-old soy sauce at a Tuesday state dinner in South Korea . One of the dishes on South Korea's state dinner for President Donald Trump: Pine mushroom rice in a stone pot, grilled Hanwoo (Korean beef) rib seasoned with a special sauce made with 360-year-old soy sauce. It's not clear whether the U.S. leader, who is on a five-nation Asia tour, ate the fermented sauce, which is a delicacy in Asia's fourth-largest economy. The full menu included: C orn porridge served with fresh herbs and vegetable side dishes Grilled sole from the South Korean island of Geoje with a Donggukjang, i.e. brown bean sauce, consomme Pine mushroom rice in a stone pot accompanied by grilled Hanwoo (Korean beef) rib seasoned with a special sauce made with a 360-year-old soy sauce Triple chocolate cake with raspberry vanilla sauce and Sujeonggwa (cinnamon punch) granita with dried persimmons Trump has built an international reputation for his all-American food preferences, which include well-done steaks with ketchup. He reportedly dislikes raw fish and on the campaign trail, frequently consumed fast food in addition to Caesar salads and spaghetti. At a 2016 rally, Trump criticized the idea of state dinners, noting that they cost a fortune. "We should be eating a hamburger on a conference table," he said at the time. Upon arriving in Tokyo for the first leg of his Asia tour, Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe lunched on hamburgers and dined on Hokkaido scallops, lobster and Wagyu beef. It's not yet known what the U.S. leader will eat in China, the next stop on his tour. On Monday, Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Hua Chunying said she could not reveal any menu details for the upcoming state visit to Beijing. A pump jack and pipes at an oil field near Bakersfield, California. Lucy Nicholson | Reuters Oil prices fell anew after briefly spiking on Wednesday after government data showed gasoline and distillate inventories fell more than expected, offsetting a surprise rise in U.S. crude stocks as imports increased. Brent futures fell 25 cents to $63.44 a barrel at 2:33 p.m. ET, after briefly rising to $64.64, near the highest level since June 2015. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) futures settled 39 cents lower, or 0.68 percent, at $56.81 a barrel, after spiking to $57.92, the highest level since July 2015. Crude inventories rose by 2.2 million barrels in the last week, compared with analysts' expectations for an decrease of 2.9 million barrels. Preliminary U.S. production figures also showed weekly output rose to an all-time high of 9.62 million barrels a day, taking out the previous record set in June 2015. Offsetting the crude build, gasoline stocks fell by 3.3 million barrels, compared with analysts' expectations in a Reuters poll for a 1.9 million-barrel drop. Distillate stockpiles, which include diesel and heating oil, were down by 3.4 million barrels, versus expectations for a 1.4 million-barrel decline, the EIA data showed. watch now U.S. gasoline inventories fell to 209.5 million barrels last week, the lowest weekly level since November 2014, according to U.S. Energy Information Administration data on Wednesday. Futures slipped earlier as Chinese crude imports fell to a one-year low, but losses were offset by investor caution over rising political tensions in the Middle East. China's October oil imports fell to just 7.3 million barrels per day from a near record-high of about 9 million bpd in September, according to data from the General Administration of Customs on Wednesday. That is the lowest level since October 2016, though imports were up 7.8 percent from a year ago. Li Yan, oil analyst with Zibo Longzhong Information Group, said the lower imports reflected fewer purchases from independent refineries, "as many of them are running out of crude quotas for this year." For next year, however, independent refiners are likely to boost their imports again as authorities on Wednesday raised the 2018 crude oil import quota by 55 percent over 2017 to 2.85 million bpd. Traders said they were closely watching escalating tensions in the Middle East, especially between regional rivals Saudi Arabia and Iran. Brent crude hit $64.65 earlier this week, its highest since mid-2015, as political tensions in the Middle East escalated after a sweeping anti-corruption purge in top crude exporter Saudi Arabia. watch now Optimism among America's small businesses have soared, but a year after President Donald Trump's election victory, Main Street advocacy groups are giving mixed reviews on his performance. The overall tone of the administration has been one of deregulation, with the president signing an executive order to curb new regulations and repeal older ones in his first month of office. The moves and continued message have sent the stock market and small business optimism to record highs over the past year. However, key campaign promises, such as Trump's promise to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, have stalled. "Small businesses are upbeat and positive about the economy. In general, they think the country is headed in the right direction," said Todd McCracken, president of the National Small Business Association, a nonpartisan advocacy group. "But in terms of accomplishments, I think they'd also say they had higher hopes on the policy front. They had wanted more pro-growth legislation, and more of the president and Congress working together on things." Optimism is still near record highs. Wells Fargo/Gallup's Small Business Index saw its largest increase in a decade in recent months and is holding steady. The National Federation of Independent Business' monthly read on sentiment peaked postelection to 105.8 in December and 105.9 in January but has since pared back, hitting 103 in September its lowest level since Trump was elected. This is still well above the historical average of 98 . Despite the drop, the conservative lobbying group said its membership is "generally very pleased" with Trump's performance thus far. "Small business is especially supportive of the president's actions on regulatory issues," said NFIB communications director Jack Mozloom. "The Federal Register is nearly empty now, thanks to his efforts to curb regulations. The cost of regulations is disproportionately heavy for small businesses. They have to spend more than their corporate cousins to comply, so this is a very big deal. Small-business owners supported his efforts to repeal and replace ObamaCare as well. And, they continue to expect substantial tax relief." But the group issued a statement last week saying it could not support the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, the Republican plan to overhaul the tax code, in its current form. It said government "should not pick winners and losers," and said the 25 percent rate for pass-through businesses isn't a "true small-business rate." Many groups were hoping for parity with large corporations, which would receive a 20 percent rate under the bill. The nonpartisan Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council noted a positive shift deregulation. The council's president and CEO, Karen Kerrigan, said the shift has enabled small companies to "plan with confidence as a variety of uncertainties have been lifted." But movement on key issues like taxes and health-care costs will be needed to bolster confidence in the administration, she added. "Small-business owners understand that everything takes longer in Washington, but they did have high expectations for President Trump getting more things done at a faster clip," Kerrigan said. "That is what he said he would do. They are expecting a signed tax reform bill. With the failure of health-care reform, they are now looking at his executive orders on health coverage to bear some fruit." McCracken echoed that point, adding that a key focus for 2018 for his group will be health-care reform. "We are hoping we can get the tax bill to where we want it to be, and the highest priority will be getting back to health-care costs to reduce them," he said. "The piece that can really come back to strangle us is health-care and its costs, so we need to get a handle on that." Scientists who understand the potential of artificial intelligence have a significant fear: killer robots, also known as autonomous weapons. In August, more than 100 technology leaders, including Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, signed an open letter calling on the United Nations to ban the development and use of artificially intelligent weaponry. Musk has tweeted that he fears a global arms race for artificial intelligence will cause the third World War. Monday, the famous physicist Stephen Hawking warned of the importance of regulating artificial intelligence: "Unless we learn how to prepare for, and avoid, the potential risks, AI could be the worst event in the history of our civilization. It brings dangers, like powerful autonomous weapons, or new ways for the few to oppress the many," he said at the Web Summit technology conference in Lisbon. On Nov. 2, hundreds of AI experts from Canada and Australia joined the chorus, submitting open letters to their respective governments urging them to support the United Nations move to ban autonomous weapons. "As you know, AI research the attempt to build machines that can perform intelligent tasks has made spectacular advances during the last decade. The evolution of classical AI, bolstered by rapid advances in machine learning, has revived the ambitions of the AI community to build machines that can carry out complex operations with or without human oversight or intervention," the Canadian community's letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says. A visitor holds a steering wheel of the Audi Elaine vehicle in the Audi AG booth during the Tokyo Motor Show at Tokyo Big Sight on October 25, 2017 in Tokyo, Japan. Audi is expanding production of what it says is a nearly carbon neutral kind of gasoline and diesel from entirely renewable sources. The German automaker, a unit of Volkswagen , said Wednesday that it plans to build a new pilot facility where it will make synthetic "e-diesel" in Laufenburg, Switzerland. Audi says its e-diesel fuel allows cars to run in a way that is almost carbon neutral meaning the fuel would not substantially add carbon emissions into the atmosphere, making the fuel potentially far more environmentally friendly. The graphic below shows how the fuel is made. The process uses electrolysis to split water into hydrogen and oxygen. The oxygen is released into the air, while the hydrogen is combined with carbon dioxide to make hydrocarbons. The carbon dioxide can be drawn from the atmosphere, Audi said. The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note sat higher at around 2.324 percent at 2:49 p.m. ET, while the yield on the 30-year Treasury bond was up at 2.782 percent. Bond yields move inversely to prices. U.S. government debt yields ticked upward on Wednesday after economic data and a new Treasury auction drew investor attention. Mortgage application volume was unchanged last week from the previous week, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. Home loan refinance applications, which usually rise when rates fall, bucked this trend, slipping 1 percent for the week on a seasonally adjusted basis. Refinance volume fell 36.5 percent compared to the same week one year ago, when interest rates were lower. The Treasury Department auctioned $23 billion in 10-year notes at a high yield of 2.314 percent. The bid-to-cover ratio, an indicator of demand, was 2.48. Indirect bidders, which include major central banks, were awarded 68 percent. Direct bidders were awarded 9 percent. Politics is also expected to set a slight tone on Wall Street as U.S. President Donald Trump continues his journey abroad in Asia this week. On Wednesday, the U.S. incumbent continued to draw attention to the threat that North Korea poses to the rest of the world, as he traveled from South Korea to China. In an address to South Korean lawmakers, Trump said that Kim Jong-Un's regime "has interpreted America's past restraint as weakness." "This would be a fatal miscalculation. This is a very different administration than the United States has had in the past," Trump said. CNBC's Nyshka Chandran contributed to this report watch now Billionaire investor Carl Icahn has been subpoenaed by federal prosecutors in New York over his role advising President Donald Trump on a federal biofuels program. Icahn, formerly a special advisor to Trump on regulations, had sought changes to the Renewable Fuel Standard, a program that requires fuel refiners to blend renewable biofuels like corn-based ethanol into gasoline and diesel. Those changes would have benefited CVR Energy , in which Icahn Associates holds an 82 percent stake. Icahn's unofficial position as a regulatory advisor to Trump drew criticism from conflicts-of-interest watchdogs immediately after it was announced last year. In May, eight Democratic senators asked U.S. regulators to investigate whether Icahn violated insider trading laws. Icahn, who has argued he was acting in the interest of American energy security, stepped down from the advisory role in August. Icahn claimed the blending requirements threatened to put small refiners out of business and jeopardize the nation's ability to produce fuel. watch now Icahn Enterprises disclosed the subpoena, issued by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York, in a quarterly report. "The U.S. Attorney's office for the Southern District of New York recently contacted Icahn Enterprises L.P. seeking production of information pertaining to our and Mr. Icahn's activities relating to the Renewable Fuels Standard and Mr. Icahn's role as an advisor to the President," the disclosure says. The company said it is cooperating with the office and providing the information requested. "The U.S. Attorney's office has not made any claims or allegations against us or Mr. Icahn," Icahn Enterprises said. The Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. bureau that oversees the Renewable Fuel Standard, last month said it would not pursue several changes to the program that would ease financial burdens for CVR Energy and other small refiners. Carl Icahn, billionaire activist investor, waits for Donald Trump, president and chief executive of Trump Organization Inc. and 2016 Republican presidential candidate, not pictured, to speak at an election night event in New York, U.S., on Tuesday, April 19, 2016. Victor J. Blue | Bloomberg | Getty Images Under the Renewable Fuel Standard, refiners who blend biofuels like ethanol into gasoline generate credits called Renewable Identification Numbers, known as RINs. Smaller refiners like CVR Refining that do not blend ethanol must buy those RINs in order to meet their obligation under the program. CVR Refining is a limited partnership controlled by CVR Energy. Icahn had lobbied for the EPA to shift the obligation to buy credits away from refiners and onto fuel blenders. Analysts told CNBC that CVR Refining appeared to be putting off buying RINs on the view that prices would fall as policy changed. Icahn himself suggested the company was not buying RINs. watch now President Donald Trump is landing in China later on Wednesday with trade and North Korea on his mind, but the Chinese have a plan to loosen him up on those topics: a charm offensive. Beijing is billing Trump's time in the country as a "state visit-plus" with some added perks that other world leaders don't see. But it's not just kindness from President Xi Jinping it's a calculated decision to play up to the U.S. leader's apparent weaknesses, experts told CNBC. The Chinese "have figured out, as many other countries have realized, that the way to win over President Trump and get him to back off some of his more hostile campaign rhetoric is to turn up the charm," said Aaron Connelly, research fellow at the Lowy Institute for International Policy. "We saw that in Tokyo, we saw that in Seoul and we expect to see that in Beijing as well," said Connelly. A major issue that the Chinese hope to distract Trump from is China's trade surplus with the U.S., which reached $26.62 billion in October. Although the surplus was lower than the record $28.08 billion in September, it was still one of the highest in recent years, a Reuters calculation showed. President Donald Trump visits the Forbidden City with China's President Xi Jinping in Beijing on November 8, 2017. Jonathan Ernst | Reuters In fact, what the Chinese and Xi want is a "very smooth visit full of pomp and circumstance and very little substance and very little friction," said Michael Fuchs, senior fellow at think tank Center for American Progress. "That's why they are rolling out the red carpet for President Trump. They are hoping they can get a lot of what they got out of President Trump at Mar-a-Lago when the two presidents met earlier this year, which again was a very smooth, one where the two leaders praised one another, talked about how wonderful the relationship is, and the kinds of ways they want to work together in the future," he added to CNBC. Beijing is attaching great importance to Trump's visit, during which he is expected to become the first U.S. president to be hosted for dinner at the Forbidden City, a former imperial palace. The Chinese foreign ministry said the hospitality for Trump's visit is equal to what Xi received at Mar-a-Lago, where the Trumps offered "hospitable and considerate reception" to the Chinese leader and his wife, spokeswoman Hua Chunying said on Tuesday. China is "under the operative notion that, with Trump, flattery will get you everywhere," said Jim McGregor, a China expert who chair's the region for consultancy APCO Worldwide. China is also probably hoping to get Trump to commit to a "great power relationship," with every other country playing minor roles, McGregor said. Or maybe Beijing is really just aiming to get the Americans "out of town without doing anything to embarrass Xi Jinping," he added. watch now China and the U.S.' competition for dominance in artificial intelligence (AI) "does seem a little like the space race of the '50s," a leading technology venture capitalist said Wednesday. Jim Breyer, founder of Breyer Capital, spoke to CNBC at Web Summit in Lisbon, Portugal. "You have two remarkable, large, innovative countries, hiring, promoting in many cases the best AI talent. And that leads to many opportunities for entrepreneurs," he said. "It is astounding what we're seeing in terms of AI technology being applied to large verticals in China." "If there is an opportunity for many European entrepreneurs, U.S.-based entrepreneurs, to start to tap in ... (to China), that's a way to double or triple the business plan metrics within 12-18 months," he added. But ultimately, Breyer said: "I don't think they'll be number one, because I think there's still a level of genius and creativity in Silicon Valley that persists and will always persist." China laid out plans in July to position itself as a world leader in AI by 2030. It aims to build a 1 trillion yuan ($150 billion) industry using a three-point roadmap, developing technology that will have application in its military and smart cities, for example. Breyer acknowledged that there were companies that have been "unable to get China right." But he cited the example of 's growth in the Middle Kingdom, exemplified by demand for its newly-released iPhone X, as a successful case. Breyer suggested that education and health care were key sectors for development. Lessons from investing in China "can be applied to other regions in really intelligent ways," added Dana Settle, co-founder and partner at venture capital firm Greycroft. Investing in China "needs to be though a well-established partnership," Settle advised, speaking about her own work partnering with local funds. The world's largest futures exchange wants to guard against extreme volatility in its planned bitcoin futures product. CME will implement special price fluctuation limits at 7 percent and 13 percent above or below the prior settlement price, and prevent trading outside the 20 percent range, according to details the exchange released Tuesday afternoon. The trading ranges are similar to what is allowed for U.S. stock index futures. But the limits could be more relevant for the notoriously volatile digital currency and could ease investor concerns about investing in the bitcoin product. Bitcoin can swing several hundred dollars in one day. In just the last few days, bitcoin hit a record high of $7,601.53 Sunday, then dropped below $7,000 before recovering to $7,500 Wednesday morning, according to CoinDesk. In September, bitcoin crashed about 40 percent from above $5,000 to below $3,000 in about two weeks. That said, some analysts have pointed out that intraday volatility in bitcoin has fallen since the early days of the digital currency. Tweet CME announced last week it is launching bitcoin futures by the end of the year, pending regulatory review. CME Chairman and CEO Terry Duffy said on CNBC's "Closing Bell" after the announcement that he is "confident" the CME's self-certification process at the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission and full application process will go through. A spokesman for the CFTC did not immediately respond to a CNBC request for comment. Other details now available on CME's website about the bitcoin futures contract include the months for the initial listing: December 2017, January 2018, February 2018 and March 2018. Contracts expire at 4 p.m. London time, typically 11 a.m. ET, on the last Friday of the contract month, according to CME's website. The website also shows trading hours are scheduled for 6 p.m. ET to 5 p.m., Sunday to Friday on CME's electronic trading system Globex and CME's over-the-counter market ClearPort. A Saudi shake-up could keep oil markets volatile and one of the world's largest energy companies said it is getting ready. Ryan Lance, CEO of Houston, Texas-based ConocoPhillips , said his company is readying itself to make profits even if oil prices dip to $40. "We can sustain our production, pay our dividend, below $40 a barrel," he said. "That's part of the transformation that we've been through." The company sold more than $16 billion in low-margin assets last year, Lance said, in a bid to make the company more resilient. An analysis conducted this summer suggested that U.S. shale producers have an average for West Texas Intermediate. Lance, who is also the chairman of the American Petroleum Insitute, made his remarks on CNBC's " " Wednesday afternoon. Oil prices have fallen for much of the last decade, though in recent weeks they have been headed upward. Brent crude, the international benchmark, hit its highest level since mid-2015 at over $64 a barrel earlier in the week and has risen more than 14 percent in the past month. Investors have had their attention on the Middle East this week as ongoing tensions between Saudi Arabia and its neighbors reached , sending oil on its recent tear higher. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz said Tuesday that Iran was guilty of "direct military aggression" after Tehran-backed Houthi rebels based in Yemen reportedly fired a missile aimed at Riyadh. The kingdom intercepted the missile. Earlier in the week, a in connection with a sprawling crackdown on influential royalty and bureaucrats that some analysts said was an effort to consolidate the crown prince's domestic powers. Analysts have said that the events in Saudi Arabia could lead to a strong decline in oil prices in the longterm even as they push them up in the short run. Dennis Gartman, an influential commodities analyst who edits the Garman Letter, said Tuesday that in the short run the by $1 or $2, though it will ultimately lead to a decline. Prices could rise as high as $70 a barrel, according to Roberto Friedlander, head of energy trading at Seaport Global Securities though Friedlander said they will later drop to $50. Shares of ConocoPhillips were up slightly Wednesday at $53.52. The company is up more than 17 percent over the past three months. Plenty of investors are wondering whether President Donald Trump is to thank for the stock market's monster rally since his election in 2016. But CNBC's Jim Cramer had some other ideas. True, the index is up 21 percent since Trump's election. But the Japanese Nikkei has rallied 33 percent, the German DAX is up nearly 28 percent, the South Korean Kospi has gained 27 percent and the Hong Kong Hang Seng ran 26 percent over the same period. "None of those moves are about Trump," the "Mad Money" host said. "The truth is, when you've got a synchronized global economic expansion, stocks tend to roar higher the world over, often regardless of the politics or style or even substance of the leader[s]." But rather than pressuring major steel producers like China and South Korea to stop dumping (keeping costs artificially low to suppress competition), Trump has adopted a different strategy. "The president has been a terrific salesman for our international companies, best in my lifetime for certain. [He's a] very commercial president, often making it clear that if foreign countries want to appease him, they need to buy and build American," Cramer said. "I think he's had some success getting foreign companies to do business here, to open more plants here, although he's been less effective at his stated objective of narrowing our trade deficits." Narrowing trade imbalances will be key to mitigating the United States' growing deficit, which the Congressional Budget Office predicted would take on an additional $1.7 trillion if the latest version of the House Republican tax plan was passed. But Cramer said that a lack of details on the plan paired with a fragmented Congress could lead to prolonged debate and few results. "My prediction? I think tax reform will go the way of 'repeal and replace.' Why? Because a major tax overhaul is really complicated, it takes a lot of time and it takes a lot more friendship than they have down there in Washington," Cramer said. "Reagan got it done in 1986, but it didn't happen overnight, it took two years, it had to happen in a bipartisan way and both sides had to like each other so that there could be some give." That said, Cramer found that much of the stock market has embraced a White House with more bark than bite and few negative surprises. So the "Mad Money" host reviewed the 10 top-performing stocks since Nov. 8, 2016 to see if the gains could be traced back to Trump. Phil Murphy's victory in New Jersey's gubernatorial race on Tuesday means Democrats now control the state government, from the legislature to the governor's mansion. And that's good news for one policy issue: marijuana legalization. Murphy ran on legalizing marijuana not just for medical uses, which is already legal in New Jersey, but recreational use as well. He proposed legalizing pot for anyone who is 21 or older. "The criminalization of marijuana has only served to clog our courts and cloud people's futures, so we will legalize marijuana," Murphy said after he won the Democratic primary. "And while there are financial benefits, this is overwhelmingly about doing what is right and just." More from Vox: A simple, boring lesson from Democrats' landslide in Virginia and beyond If you care about ending mass incarceration, look at what Philadelphia just did A transgender woman defeated a man who authored a bathroom bill in Virginia in Tuesday's election The legislature seems ready. State Sen. President Stephen Sweeney plans to pass a legalization bill in the first 100 days of Murphy's administration, according to NJ.com. "Assuming Murphy wins, it's full-steam ahead," state Sen. Nicholas Scutari, a Democrat who sponsored a marijuana legalization bill, told NJ.com. The Democrat-controlled legislature was receptive to legalization before Murphy was elected. But outgoing Gov. Chris Christie is very opposed to the idea, calling it "beyond stupidity." It was a good night to be a Democrat, as the party's candidates won a slate of closely watched races stretching from Virginia to Washington state on Tuesday. At the gubernatorial level, Democrat Ralph Northam defeated Republican Ed Gillespie in a hotly contested race in Virginia, which many analysts viewed as a referendum on President Donald Trump. The victory was "a backlash to Trump and Trumpism, pure and simple," wrote Larry Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia. Larry Sabato tweet: Dear Pundit Friends, please stop attributing this D landslide in VA to "changing demographics". VA hasn't changed that much since last Nov. 8 (Hillary by 5%). The bigger explanation is a backlash to Trump and Trumpism, pure and simple. #VAGov In New Jersey, Democrat Phil Murphy won a gubernatorial race against Republican Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, who struggled to get out from under the shadow of the deeply unpopular outgoing governor, Republican Chris Christie. Moving down the ballot, Democrats in Virginia also won competitive races for lieutenant governor and attorney general. In January of 2018, Democrat Justin Fairfax will be sworn in as lieutenant governor, making him the first African American elected to statewide office in Virginia since 1989. And the state's attorney general, Democrat Mark Herring, was reelected after a bitter campaign. In Virginia's legislature, Democrats flipped at least 10 seats in the Republican controlled House of Delegates, and it was still unclear late Tuesday night which party would control the chamber, which has been under a Republican majority since 1999. Razor thin margins in at least five races Tuesday made it likely that provisional and absentee ballots would need to be counted, potentially delaying results. The party's victories in Virginia energized Democrats across the country, as Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe (D) told The Washington Post. "This, what a sparkplug," he said. "This is the revitalization of the Democratic Party in America. This isn't just about Virginia tonight." In Washington state, control of the state senate also went to Democrats, when Manka Dhingra won a special election, giving the party a one-seat majority, and putting the state government fully under the control of Democrats, who hold the governorship and the majority in Washington's House of Representatives. Mayoral races, too, produced a swath of Democratic victories, most notably in New York City, where mayor Bill de Blasio cruised to victory over Republican Nicole Malliotakis. Voters in Charlotte, N.C. elected the city's first African American female mayor, Democrat Vi Lyles. In Hoboken, N.J., City Councilman Ravi Bhalla (D) beat five other candidates to become the city's first Sikh mayor, according to The Associated Press. Democrats attributed much of their success Tuesday to an energized party base that is deeply opposed to Trump's policies and his rhetoric. Former Vice President Joe Biden captured what many in the party were feeling: Joe Biden tweet: "A resounding defeat tonight for President Trump. Voters around the country rejected the ugly politics we have seen this past year. Instead, they chose candidates who unite and inspire us." Some very smart people say that robots are going to steal your job. Researchers at Oxford University estimate that 47 percent of U.S. jobs could be replaced by robots, automated technology and automated intelligence (AI) within the next 20 years. Jeff Hesse, PwC principal and U.S. people and organization co-leader, tells CNBC Make It, "The displacement is already beginning to happen." Elon Musk told the National Governors Association, "There certainly will be job disruption. Because what's going to happen is robots will be able to do everything better than us." Musk even went so far as to say that "AI is a fundamental risk to the existence of human civilization." John Cryan, the millionaire CEO of Deutsche Bank, is the latest industry leader to suggest that technology will lead to significant layoffs and possibly sooner than we think. John Cryan, CEO of Deutsche Bank Thomas Lohnes | Getty Images watch now European stocks ended under slight pressure on Wednesday as investors digested the latest coming out of the earnings space. The pan-European Stoxx 600 came off its session lows to finish down 0.05 percent provisionally, while sectors pointed in opposite directions by the close. European markets Major bourses, meanwhile, ended mixed, with the U.K.'s FTSE 100 rising 0.22 percent, and Germany's DAX ending above the flatline, up 0.02 percent. France's CAC 40 , however, slipped 0.17 percent. Financials and banking stocks underperformed several sectors Wednesday, on earnings and doubts over U.S. plans to reform the tax system. French bank Credit Agricole fell over 3 percent after posting lower net profits. Italy's BPM meanwhile sank 7.5 percent, after it was halted during early morning trading, Reuters reported. Elsewhere, the European Union put forward tougher car emissions objectives Wednesday, which included a credit system for automakers to push the rollout of electric vehicles and fines for exceeding carbon dioxide limits; Reuters reported. Autos sank 1.31 percent, making it Europe's worst performing sector of the day. Utility stocks fluctuated during trade, before recovering to close up. Investors showed concern during the session over regulation on a proposed merger between the British firm SSE and Innogy. They announced earlier that they would merge their British retail energy business. SSE fell to the bottom of the index, while Innogy finished higher. More earnings shake up sentiment Marks & Spencer closed up 1.6 percent after announcing pretax profits slightly above forecasts, though lower from a year ago. The clothing and homeware arm of the British brand struggled, but its food and international business grew. Retail as a whole outshone with Ahold Delhaize rising 5.1 percent, after third-quarter earnings beat estimates. Carrefour also jumped 3.15 percent. Europe's best performer however was Ubisoft , which rose over 9 percent, after posting second-quarter sales above forecasts. Persimmon meantime dropped 3.5 percent, though the housebuilder said that forward sales beyond 2017 were up 10 percent and it had sold all of its stock for the current year. The British firm acquired more than 5,500 new plots in the third quarter of the year. Pharmaceutical company Lundbeck sank more than 7 percent, after it posted its latest earnings report. While third quarter operating profit exceeded market expectations, sales of its more recent drugs failed to meet forecasts. Elsewhere in the world Financial technology (fintech) start-up Revolut is seeking to obtain a European banking license, and aims to expand its app-based bank to new markets. The London, U.K.-based firm is currently a financial services firm but is hoping to obtain a formal banking license in the region so it can offer more to its customers. Once licensed under European rules, it would be able to provide deposit and credit services, including overdrafts, personal loans and deposits held at a fixed term. Customers would also be able to deposit savings of up to 100,000 euros ($115,765), under EU protections. Launched in 2015, Revolut's app currently allows customers to open a current account in 60 seconds, and includes a pre-paid contactless MasterCard debit card, currency exchange and a peer-to-peer payments service. Chief Executive and co-founder Nikolay Storonsky explained that the push to become a bank was part of his fintech firm's ambition to expand in Europe. "Revolut is aggressively expanding its product range and geographic areas of operation. As a global financial services institution, we've accepted that we operate in a highly regulated environment where consumer protection and trust are paramount," he told CNBC in an email Monday. "As such, we're embracing the higher regulatory and reporting burden associated with running a bank, as an inevitable consequence of building trust in our brand. We know we'll be held to a very high standard of service and are prepared to demonstrate our ability to meet that challenge." The firm is one of many challenger banks that are taking aim at the customer base of more established lenders. As incoming European rules force banks to open up their customer data to third parties, fintech start-ups are hoping to take advantage. A number of challengers have been set up across Europe, including Britain's Starling Bank and Germany's N26. Both Starling and N26 have already secured banking licenses. Asked how the firm differentiated from its fintech competitors, Storonsky said: "We'll continue to innovate and offer great products to our users. We'll also have a higher level of regulatory oversight which we believe will build trust in our brand. Sometimes the best way to disrupt an industry is from within, so keep watching this space." The business said it had been in talks with Lithuania's central bank to prepare ahead of its EU license application. Last week, the tongue-in-cheek video Max Lanman posted to Reddit advertising his then-girlfriend's used 1996 Honda Accord with 141,095 miles on it went viral. As of Wednesday morning, it has over four million views on YouTube. It looks and sounds like so many upscale car commercials. A driver puts a key into the ignition and takes off. A narrator talks in a soothing, baritone voice about how she is "one of a kind." The music picks up and you see the car from a bird's eye view, zooming along a scenic highway overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The ad is both satirical and serious. The narrator's deep-sounding message never really comes together. A close up reveals that one of the car's tires is a little flat. White text positioned like billboards on the side of the road reads, for example, "Starting at $499." It's selling a real car but it's also mocking the way real cars are sold. Max Lanman and Carrie Hollenbeck with their 1996 Honda Accord, "Greenie" Source: Max Lanman "The idea came to me when I was driving the very stretch of highway that you see in the commercial," Lanman, the writer and director behind the project, tells CNBC Make It. He's the founder of a creativity agency based out of Los Angeles, Calif., called, LEAO, which makes ads, virtual reality and branded content for companies like Microsoft and Haagen-Dazs. "It just dawned on me that making a high-end car commercial for a really crappy car might be funny, and Carrie fortunately had just the car for the job." Carrie Hollenbeck, now Lanman's fiancee, is not the actress in the video. That's their friend, Anne Marie Avey. "Carrie's a little bit camera shy so she didn't want to be the main character," says Lanman. But she was the stunt driver for the aerial shots that Lanman took with his drone, a DJI Phantom 3 Professional. He also used his own SONY A7S2 camera. In fact, except for a pickup truck he rented out to shoot some of the footage, Lanman says he did the entire project with his own equipment and with his own friends. The other cameraman is his buddy Christopher Ripley. The video's narrator with the born-for-radio voice is his neighbor, Matt Pratt. And the cat, Papa Puff Pants, belongs to Avey. The commercial hardly cost them a thing. Lanman acknowledges that they put in 200-some hours over the course of a year. And 200 hours might seem like a lot of effort to sell a car with a Kelly Blue Book value of $1,500. Still, he says, "the experience of doing it was just a blast. That was our M.O. from the beginning. If we have fun making this, then it will be worth it." Max Lanman and Christopher Ripley filming the commercial Source: Max Lanman Richard Smith, former chairman and CEO of Equifax Inc., testifies before House Energy and Commerce hearing on "Oversight of the Equifax Data Breach: Answers for Consumers" on Capitol Hill in Washington, October 3, 2017. U.S. Senators grilled current and former executives at Yahoo and Equifax on Wednesday, trying to ascertain what if anything companies can do to prevent future data breaches of massive proportion. Yahoo, now owned by Verizon , and Equifax, are two companies which were hit with some of the biggest data breaches of all time. The former CEOs of the two companies apologized for their roles in the hacks in testimony to the Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation on Wednesday. But at least one senator found the testimony "discouraging," as companies also sustained that they had fallen victim to bad actors, and that even high amounts of security spending would be limited by current privacy standards and law enforcement collaborations. "I can't think of a clearer definition of gross negligence anywhere," Sen. Gary Peters, a Michigan Democrat, said of the Equifax attack. "A company that has been entrusted with the most sensitive data and customers didn't have a choice for you to hold it .... you're holding that and you don't take precautions." Yahoo revealed last month that every account 3 billion in all was affected by a 2013 data breach. The revelation built on previous disclosures that more than 1 billion accounts were hacked. Hackers stole email addresses, passwords, birth dates, telephone numbers and more in the attack, but did not access passwords in clear text, payment card data or information about bank accounts. "Yahoo was the victim of criminal state-sponsored attacks on its systems, resulting in the theft of certain user information," Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer said. "We worked hard over the years to earn our users' trust. As CEO, these thefts occurred during my tenure, and I want to sincerely apologized to each and every one of our users." Two Russian intelligence agents and two other people have been indicted in connection with the "highly complex" attack of at least 500 million Yahoo accounts. Mayer said on Wednesday one of these actors is considered one of the most dangerous hackers in the world, and that to this day, Yahoo has not been able to find the intrusion that led to some of the thefts. Greg Steltenpohl knows how to create a beverage empire. He's done it before. This time he wants to disrupt the dairy case and the food system. Steltenpohl co-founded Odwalla in 1980 and built it into a successful juice company before selling to Coca-Cola in 2001. Now he's back with his latest venture, Califia Farms. The brand started making juices but in seven years has expanded to almond milks, non-dairy creamers and cold brew coffees. Out of its 76 total products, 28 are coffee drinks.The category as a whole is growing, and Califia is trying to capture the plant-based corner. Almond milk still represents a sliver of the nearly $16 billion milk category. But its market share is growing, as more people eat and drink less dairy or drop it altogether for health and sustainability reasons. "We don't like to be dogmatic about it," said Steltenpohl, co-founder and CEO of Califia Farms. "We want to make it easy for people to go plant-based and dairy-free with better packaging, more enticing flavors and the exploratory aspect of it." Steltenpohl wants to infuse creativity into the dairy case that he criticizes as only being differentiated only by things like skim, whole and chocolate. Some of Califia's flavors include cinnamon horchata, chocolate coconut and even holiday nog. The packaging could lure the casual consumer who notices Califia's bottles are shaped differently than traditional milk cartons or jugs. Their necks are skinny and their bottoms curve out. Their labels could entice the more health-conscious consumer with buzzwords like soy free, dairy free, gluten free and carrageenan free. Steltenpohl argues that nut milks naturally present more opportunity for innovation and experimentation than their dairy peers. Sun Country Airlines is throwing in the towel on scheduled flights to Cuba, citing shaky demand and restrictions on travel to the island. The privately held Minnesota-based airline told the U.S. Department of Transportation in a motion earlier this month that it would relinquish its rights to operate the scheduled flights to Santa Clara and Matanzas, from Minneapolis-St. Paul. The Trump administration on Wednesday released a list of restrictions that would make it more difficult for U.S. citizens to travel to the island, including ending individual, so-called "people-to-people" cultural exchanges that were permitted under loosened rules introduced by the Obama administration. Instead, travelers who want to visit Cuba for nonacademic, people-to-people exchanges will have to travel in a group run by an organization that is subject U.S. jurisdiction, and accompanied by a representative of the sponsoring organization, the new rules say. The rules take effect on Thursday. President Donald Trump in June called for an end to some of the recently loosened travel regulations. U.S. commercial carriers rushed to get permission to start commercial flights to the island, the first such flights in more than 50 years, landing on the island with a fanfare of water-cannon salutes. But demand for flights to some smaller Cuban cities has been weaker than what some carriers anticipated, as key lodging infrastructure is lacking compared with other Caribbean destinations that are easier for American tourists to visit. "Sun Country Airlines is no longer considering operating scheduled service from Minneapolis/St. Paul to Cuba due to continued regulatory and market uncertainties," a Sun Country Airlines spokeswoman told CNBC. Other airlines have scaled back on service to Cuba or canceled the routes altogether amid high competition and lackluster demand to meet the supply of flights. Silver Airways called off flights to the island, citing competition from larger carriers. Spirit Airlines announced earlier in the year it was ending its flights to Cuba. American Airlines last year cut the number of its daily flights to Cuba from 13 to 10, a few months after it launched service to the island. This winter, it will cut a flight from Miami to Cienfuegos, bringing the daily total to nine, a decision made earlier this year, a spokesman said. Spokespeople for Delta Air Lines and Southwest Airlines , which both offer flights to Havana, said they are reviewing the new restrictions. The new Trump administration restrictions also prohibit American travelers from staying in more than 80 Cuban hotels. For its part, home-sharing giant Airbnb said it was also reviewing and planned to comply with the new regulations. Panera Bread said Wednesday that its founder, chairman and CEO, Ron Shaich, will be stepping down from the CEO post, but not before repurchasing Au Bon Pain in one of his last acts as head executive. Shaich is no stranger to Au Bon Pain, having merged his cookie store, the Cookie Jar, with the bakery in the 1980s, creating the Au Bon Pain Company. In the early '90s the company acquired the Saint Louis Bread Company, which would go on to be renamed Panera. In 1991, the company went public, with Shaich on board as the CEO. However, seven years later, Shaich sold all of the Au Bon Pain divisions to focus on growing the Panera brand. The company did not disclose the terms of the acquisition of Au Bon Pain, which has about 300 locations. The acquisition will allow Panera to grow its business in locations with a smaller footprint. Au Bon Pain has shops in transportation terminals and hospitals that a traditional Panera restaurant would not fit into. "This is not about me," Shaich told CNBC. "This transaction makes powerful sense for Panera." Shaich's departure from the position of CEO and the purchase of Au Bon Pain comes just six months after Panera was purchased by JAB Holding for about $7.5 billion. Shaich said at the time that Panera had proven to be a successful public company, but that he would be able to do more as a private business. Shaich told CNBC that "our friends JAB completely supports" Panera's acquisition of Au Bon Pain. JAB, a privately held company headquartered in Luxembourg, may not be a household name, but its brands are. The company owns Keurig Green Mountain and Krispy Kreme Doughnuts. Dunkin' Brands, a long-speculated target for JAB, recently saw shares jump amid renewed chatter. Meanwhile, JAB has been selling off several of its luxury brands in order to focus on faster-growing consumer sectors and has been steadily creating a coffee and breakfast empire over the last five years. Shaich, who will stay on as executive chairman, is handing the keys over to Blaine Hurst, the current president of Panera. Hurst will continue in his role as president, as well. "Blaine has been a key player in our efforts to transform Panera during the past half-decade," Shaich said in a statement Wednesday. "He is very well known and respected in our organization and in our industry for his innovative thinking, technological savvy and ability to drive change." Hurst joined Panera in 2010 to work on the company's $42 million investment, Panera 2.0. These efforts modernized the company's order and pay processes with fast-lane kiosks and mobile order to speed customers through the checkout and also improved the way it trained its staff. Hurst held several posts before becoming the company's president, focusing on manufacturing, supply chain, information technology, digital, human resources and consumer packaged goods. "This is the right time for me to step down as CEO while still staying involved in the business as Chairman," Shaich said. "I returned in 2011 because our growth was slowing and we needed to reposition Panera as a better competitive alternative with expanded growth opportunities. And I'm happy to say we've done just that." Qualcomm Inc. CEO Steve Mollenkopf speaks during a keynote address at CES 2017 on January 6, 2017 in Las Vegas, Nevada. Even if Qualcomm declines Broadcom's $103 billion buyout bid, shares of the chipmaker still have plenty of ways of climbing higher over the next year, according to one Wall Street analyst. RBC Capital Markets upgraded Qualcomm shares to outperform from sector perform Tuesday, with a $70 price target, noting that Broadcom's recent bid implied the stock could gain another 10 percent. But "with or without" Broadcom, analyst Amit Daryanani contends the stock could still gain over the next year. "The probability of the initial unsolicited bid becoming the final bid is low and therefore think there is an upside narrative here," wrote Daryanani in a note to clients. But even "if QCOM board rejects the offer, we think the roadmap for value creation is fairly distinct." Qualcomm shares have risen roughly 17 percent since Friday, when reports of a potential bid from Broadcom first surfaced. The $70 per share cash and stock offer would be the largest technology acquisition ever. Shares of Qualcomm were up 1.4 percent Wednesday. But even without a deal, Daryanani believes the company can grow on its own. Qualcomm's deal with NXP Semiconductors is expected to close within the next few months, adding $1.20 to earnings per share. Qualcomm announced that it agreed to buy NXP for about $38 billion last year, as it seeks to expand the reach of its chips from phones to cars. Improving relations with Apple would also bode well for Qualcomm, which supplies chips for the iPhone. The two companies have been locked in a multinational legal battle throughout the year; Apple teed off the dispute in January by suing Qualcomm for $1 billion for excessive royalties. "Our investment thesis assumes Qualcomm and Apple should be able to resolve the dispute in calendar year 2018, possibly with Qualcomm offering some level of concessions," added the analyst. "Should Apple and Qualcomm settle the dispute, we believe payments from Apple will resume and Qualcomm should expect catch-up payments from Apple as well." There are users that "misbehave" on Reddit but they a minority, the chief executive of the content sharing website said Wednesday. "Yes, there is misbehavior, but that's generally in the minority, and it's very important to us that we make the voices of various groups on Reddit, the volume of their voices proportionate to the size of the audience," Steve Huffman told CNBC at the Web Summit conference in Lisbon, Portugal. "Because I think people not just Redditors, but people are fundamentally good and interesting and if you give them an opportunity to do so they will be." Reddit has tried to crack down on a number of controversial communities, called "subreddits," on the site in recent years, due to the distribution of offensive content. The site has moved to "quarantine" certain subreddits, essentially preventing users from posting images or generating revenue, in an effort to quell the prominence of these online groups. One particular group, r/The_Donald, was brought into question last year during the U.S. presidential election battle between Democrat candidate Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump. r/The_Donald is a subreddit devoted to supporters of the now-President Trump. Huffman himself was at the center of a row with the subreddit in November last year. The Reddit CEO admitted he had edited comments from Reddit users criticizing him, by changing references to his own username and replacing them with moderators of the pro-Trump community. Huffman said: "We generally at Reddit want these things to play out, let communities be themselves, let people be themselves. But there are limits to that. In the same way there are limits to free speech in the U.S., there's limits to what you can do on Reddit. Where we draw the line is when it effects people's safety." Addressing the fact that he edited users' comments, he said: "That was done in jest it wasn't totally received that way but I think within our community it wasn't the craziest thing that's happened on Reddit." Reddit has since come down hard on controversial subreddits. In October, the site implemented a ban on content that "glorifies, incites, or calls for violence or physical harm against an individual or a group of people." This led to the shutting down of Nazi groups, including r/NationalSocialism, r/Nazi and r/Far_Right. The Senate tax plan is not expected to include a controversial 20 percent excise tax on imports by multinational companies, according to three people briefed on the issue. The tax is a critical revenue raiser in the House bill worth about $155 billion over a decade and applies to purchases by U.S. subsidiaries of multinational businesses from their foreign counterparts. Among the most vocal opponents of the new fee is the conservative advocacy group Americans for Prosperity, which called it a "backdoor border adjustment tax." The fee covers both intangible goods such as intellectual property as well as consumer parts. But unlike the border adjustment tax a proposal that Republicans have discarded the transactions must occur within a single parent company. Business groups such as the Organization for International Investment also fear the tax could disrupt international supply chains and raise costs for multinational companies and ultimately consumers. "It's an extraterritorial reach into global supply chains that were never part of the U.S. tax base," OFII President Nancy McLernon said. "It will have a disproportionate impact on international companies that have made a deliberate decision to invest and create jobs in the United States." Last week, House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady defended the tax as a crucial to ensuring that companies do not shift profits overseas. He said that the border adjustment tax was abandoned months ago and that the excise tax in the current bill bears no resemblance to that proposal. "It's nowhere near this," he told reporters. The Senate Finance Committee in response to a request for comment said it could not get into the details of the plan. Correction: The conservative advocacy group Americans for Prosperity is opposing the new fee. An earlier version misstated its name. 's vice president for engineering is leaving the company following . Tim Sehn resigned Tuesday the same day the company reported earnings after more than four years as the company's head engineer. Snap CEO Evan Spiegel said Tuesday the company would be to make it easier to use. Snap reported revenue that missed Wall Street estimates and posted earnings that did better than estimates, though still represented a loss per share. News of his departure was first reported by The Information. Shares of online publishing and e-book company China Literature got off to a roaring start on their first day of trade in Hong Kong, surging as much as 100 percent in the morning session. The company raised a total of 8.3 billion Hong Kong dollars ($1.1 billion) after pricing its 151 million share offering at HK$55 ($7.05) the top of its range apiece. Ahead of its debut, shares of China Literature had been overbought by more than 600 times. As of 1:00 p.m. HK/SIN, shares of the online literature platform traded at HK$105 that's about 90 percent above its issue price. Part of the reason for the astronomical jump in the company's share price has been its affiliation with internet giant Tencent , which owns around 62 percent of China Literature's issued shares. "The key point is Tencent," Kenny Wen, a Hong Kong-based strategist at Sun Hung Kai Financial, told CNBC. As online literature was not as large of a phenomenon in Hong Kong as it was on the mainland, Hong Kong retail investors unable to understand China Literature's underlying business proposition were likely buying the stock based on name recognition, he indicated. For those investors, there was the hope that "China Literature may be another Tencent," Wen explained. China Literature generates revenues from intellectual property licensing, the sale of physical books and charging readers for access to its online content library. Some 6.4 million writers and 9.6 million works were available on its platform at the end of June this year, the company said in its prospectus. For about 48 hours after a deadly rampage at a Texas church, the FBI and other law enforcement agencies did not ask Apple to help them unlock the gunman's iPhone or associated online accounts, a source told Reuters on Wednesday. A cellphone belonging to Devin Kelley -- accused of killing 26 people before taking his own life -- was sent to the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Quantico, Virginia, crime lab because authorities could not unlock it, Christopher Combs, head of the FBI's San Antonio field office, said on Tuesday. Combs did not specify what kind of phone Kelley had during the attack in Sutherland Springs, Texas, but the Washington Post reported on Tuesday that it was an iPhone, citing sources close to the investigation. The Reuters source said that in the 48 hours between Sunday's shooting and Combs's news conference Apple had received no requests from federal, state or local law enforcement authorities for technical assistance with Kelley's phone or his associated online accounts at Apple. The delay may prove important. If Kelley had used a fingerprint to lock his iPhone, Apple could have told officials they could use the dead man's finger to unlock his device, so long as it had not been powered off and restarted. But iPhones locked with a fingerprint ask for the user's pass code after 48 hours if they have not been unlocked by then. Officials also could have asked for data from Kelley's iCloud online storage account if he had one. If it receives a warrant or court order, Apple will give law enforcement authorities iCloud data, as well as the keys needed to decrypt it. If an iPhone user backs up their iPhone using iCloud, the online data can contain texts, photographs and other information from the phone. It could not be learned whether Apple had received a court order to turn over iCloud data. The FBI declined to comment when asked about the type of phone used by Kelly. A spokeswoman referred to Combs' news conference on Tuesday. The FBI has criticized Apple for how difficult it is to obtain data from its devices when they are locked. The phones contain a so-called "secure enclave" that makes it difficult to crack their encryption, and too many errant attempts to unlock an iPhone can erase all data. The FBI challenged Apple in court over access to an iPhone after a 2015 mass shooting in San Bernardino. The legal issues behind the case were never settled because the FBI found third-party software that allowed it to crack the device. In the year since he was elected, President Donald Trump has been willing to blast or praise specific companies by name on Twitter, and that's doing measurable harm or benefit to the stock prices of those firms in the short term, a CNBC analysis has found. We've never seen a president as willing to criticize American companies as Trump has in the year since Election Day. He's name-checked more than 15 companies on Twitter in that time, several of them more than once. Tweet He has sparred with Boeing over the cost of the Air Force One program. ("Cancel order!") He's blasted the retailer Nordstrom after it announced it would drop his daughter's product line. ("My daughter Ivanka has been treated so unfairly by @Nordstrom.") And he lit into the pharmaceutical giant Merck after that company's CEO resigned from the president's manufacturing council in the wake of the president's racially tinged response to events in Charlottesville, Virginia. ("@Merck Pharma is a leader in higher & higher drug prices while at the same time taking jobs out of the U.S."). Tweet The president has also praised companies by name when they take steps that dovetail with his agenda. He lauded ExxonMobil in March when it announced new details of an expansion it began in 2013. ("Buy American & hire American are the principals at the core of my agenda, which is: JOBS, JOBS, JOBS! Thank you @exxonmobil," the president tweeted on March 6, before correcting the spelling to "principles" a few hours later.) Trump lavished Ford with praise when the automaker announced new details of a long-running plan to invest billions in new plants in the U.S. ("Big announcement by Ford today.") And sometimes he has commended companies he previously blasted, apparently concluding the situation has turned to his benefit. On Jan. 3, the president blasted General Motors in a tweet criticizing it for its production of the Chevy Cruze in Mexico. "Make in U.S.A. or pay big border tax," the president wrote. But all seemed forgiven by Jan. 24, when automakers went to the White House. "Great meeting with Ford CEO Mark Fields and General Motors CEO Mary Barra at the @WhiteHouse today," the president wrote. Tweet Tweet These tweets aren't just empty pixels. They have a surprisingly large short-term impact on the company's stock prices. On average, a negative tweet by the president caused an immediate short-term negative 1.2 percent move in the targeted company's stock price, CNBC's analysis found. Similarly, a positive tweet by the president generated an immediate short-term 1.1 percent move higher. Tweet That has a real dollars and cents impact, although short-lived. Averaged out, positive Trump tweets generated $1 billion in market value for the companies in the short term, and the negative tweets slashed $1.3 billion in market value in trading shortly after the tweet. To be sure, there are a lot of trends that move stock prices on a given day, and each situation is unique to the company involved. But it does appear the president has a power no previous holder of the executive office wielded: the ability to move markets with a tweet. Correction: This story was revised to correct that Trump's tweet was targeting Boeing about Air Force One. President Donald Trump salutes as he walks to Air Force One prior to departing from Langley Air Force Base in Virginia, March 2, 2017, as he traveled to Newport News, Virginia, to visit the pre-commissioned USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier. President Donald Trump made a campaign promise to eliminate the defense sequester and submit a new budget that would "rebuild our military." A year after the election, though, Trump has not made good on his campaign pledge to increase military spending and fully eliminate the defense sequester, or the automatic federal spending cuts mandated under the 2011 Budget Control Act. Getting rid of the budget caps will require at least 60 votes in the GOP-controlled Senate, or support of every Republican and eight Democratic senators. Also, Trump's call for a Navy of up to 355 deployable ships up from the current 278 is delayed. His fiscal 2018 request unveiled in May didn't include a major buildup but only eight new vessels, part of his predecessor's plan. During the campaign, Trump also complained about a shrinking Army and the Air Force flying old planes. "They haven't yet come up with a budget that does much more than what President Obama was going to do but there's still hope that they will do so," said Dan Blumenthal, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington-based conservative think tank. Pentagon officials have said the Trump administration is waiting until its fiscal 2019 budget request to begin ramping up national defense spending and modernization initiatives and in the near term focusing investments on military combat readiness. It comes amid increased threats from nuclear-armed North Korea and progress by Russia and China in closing the military-technology gap with the U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis pointed out in June that there've been nine years of continuing resolutions by Congress, resulting in negative impacts to military readiness, innovation and modernization. The Pentagon is currently operating under a short-term CR, which expires Dec. 8. Still, major defense stocks are up 30 percent or more since Trump was elected a year ago compared with the S&P 500 index gaining about 20 percent. Boeing has been a top performer with a gain of more than 85 percent in the past year but analysts say that is more reflective of its booming commercial aircraft business. If national defense spending is increased, investors could see defense stocks going even higher due to "great upside to earnings," said Jim Corridore, a defense analyst at CFRA Research in New York. Meantime, Trump has delegated more authority to the Pentagon than his predecessor. "We have seen the president grant the Department of Defense and Secretary Mattis more authorities to prosecute the various wars and conflicts," said Thomas Spoehr, director of the Center for National Security at the Heritage Foundation, a Washington-based conservative think tank. Trump authorized Mattis to send more troops to Afghanistan. Similarly, Mattis can decide whether to go up or down on troop numbers in Iraq and Syria, without having to go back to the president for repeated approvals. By comparison, two former Pentagon chiefs under President Barack Obama essentially accused the commander in chief and the White House National Security Council of micromanaging military action, including basic strategy and tactics as well as the use ground combat troops. Spoehr, a retired Army lieutenant general, said the granting of authority "conveys a lot of trust to the Department of Defense that trickles down all the way to the lowest level. I wouldn't underestimate how he has kind of given the Pentagon more authority within some defined limits." Yet Trump also surprised the Pentagon in July by tweeting a ban on transgender people serving in the military. The action touched off criticism from even some Republican lawmakers, including Sen. John McCain, and a federal court recently blocked enforcement of the ban. In the Middle East, Trump stepped up the fight against the so-called Islamic State with increased airstrikes. Today, the terror group no longer controls Raqqa, Syria, the self-described capital of the caliphate. "I totally changed rules of engagement," Trump told radio host Chris Plante recently. "I totally changed our military. I totally changed the attitudes of the military and they have done a fantastic job. Yeah, ISIS is now giving up." Regardless, Trump has demonstrated a willingness to promote U.S. arms on his trips abroad, whether Saudi Arabia, Poland, Israel or his visit this week to Japan. "Trump has been a bit of a salesman for the defense industry, and that's led to some incremental deals," said Corridore. "We've seen nothing certainly that has moved the dial for the U.S. defense industry, but it's positive for sure." On Monday, Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe held a press conference in Tokyo and discussed the threat from nuclear-armed North Korea, and they spoke about Japan purchasing U.S. military equipment. North Korea has test-fired several ballistic missiles that have flown over Japanese territory or splashed down in waters inside the country's exclusive economic zone. "He will shoot them out of the sky when he completes the purchase of lots of additional military equipment from the United States," Trump remarked Monday. "He will easily shoot them out of the sky, just like we shot something out of the sky the other day in Saudi Arabia, as you saw." It was a Raytheon -made Patriot air defense missile system deployed in Saudi Arabia that thwarted a ballistic missile attack by Houthi rebels in Yemen against the kingdom's capital city of Riyadh on Saturday. In May, the White House announced an agreement for Saudi Arabia to buy $110 billion worth of U.S. weapons including more Patriot defense systems ahead of Trump's state visit to the kingdom. Yet some question whether Trump is taking credit for some multibillion-dollar arms sales that were already in the works when he took office, such as the Saudi weapons deal. "A lot of these sales were negotiated before, so I think some of it is just pushing this narrative that it's good for jobs, good for the economy elements he's been sort of trumpeting since January 20," said Mike Noonan, director of the Program on National Security at Foreign Policy Research Institute, a think tank in Philadelphia. Even so, the Trump administration is working to make it easier to sell U.S.-made military drones to allies such as India since China and Israel have profited when the U.S. turns down business. In June, the U.S. approved the sale of $2 billion worth of drones made by California-based General Atomics to India. The administration also is considering selling the Lockheed Martin -made F-35 stealth fighter jets to the United Arab Emirates, which has long had economic ties to Iran. If that happens, it would be only the second country in the Middle East after Israel to have the advanced aircraft. Trump also has spent the last year critical of the Iran nuclear deal, which was orchestrated by Obama. Last month, Trump said he won't certify the Iran deal and is pushing for fixes. The administration also placed new sanctions on Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards. "In the event we are not able to reach a solution working with Congress and our allies, then the agreement will be terminated," Trump said. President Donald Trump arrived in Beijing for his first official visit to China, with North Korea and billions of dollars in trade deals high on the agenda. Trump and First Lady Melania will spend two days in China's capital, hosted by China's President Xi Jinping and his wife, Peng Liyuan, which senior Chinese officials are describing as a "state visit plus." Analysts said the summit would feature plenty of pomp, ceremony and corporate deals, but likely little substantive progress on trade and investment imbalances between the world's two largest economies. Likewise few are expecting much progress on tackling the problem of North Korea. Trump has signaled that this trip would be unlike previous U.S. presidential visits to China, which usually include meetings with human rights representatives, much to the annoyance of Chinese hosts. Trump's schedule included no reference to any such meetings. Shen Dingli, a professor of American studies at Fudan University in Shanghai, said: "Such meetings are very unlikely to happen. Such a move would hinder [Trump's] agenda to make American great again. This would annoy China, and it doesn't look like Trump will do this." Instead, Trump congratulated Xi on his re-anointment as paramount leader by the 19th Communist party Congress last month, tweeting before his flight to Beijing: "I very much look forward to meeting with President Xi, who is just off his great political victory." The first item on the itinerary was a tour of Beijing's Forbidden City, the former imperial residence in Beijing. Trump and First Lady Melania are scheduled to attend a private dinner with Xi and Peng, with more substantive meetings between the two presidents scheduled for Thursday. The famously smoggy skies in Beijing were uncharacteristically clear for the occasion, while Beijing was under virtual lockdown the Forbidden City had been shut to tourists since late on Tuesday to prepare for Trump's visit, many roads were closed, and Beijing was blanketed with a heavy police and military presence. ChinaUS deals agreed during Trump visit JD.com, the Chinese e-commerce group, agreed to buy $1.2 billion of U.S. pork and beef over the next three years, one of the biggest deals signed during the state visit on Wednesday. The agreement includes buying at least $200 million of beef over three years from the Montana Stockgrowers Association, a deal made possible after China lifted a ban on beef exports from the United States in May, one of the few concessions granted to the Trump administration during its first 100-day period of talks with China. JD will also invest $100 million to build the first beef-processing facilities in Montana to build up its supply chain there. Separately, Minnesota-based wastewater treatment company Viroment also signed $800 million of deals, to build plants with various partners in China. Aside from individual business deals, many of which were agreed separately to the state visit, no broader trade deal was announced. Wilbur Ross, the U.S. Commerce Secretary, said that $9 billion in new corporate deals had been signed on Wednesday between Chinese and U.S. companies, with more to come on Thursday. The U.S. trade delegation accompanying Trump is dominated by manufacturing and industrial companies, such as Boeing and DowDuPont. "Addressing the imbalance in China trade has been the main focus of collaborative discussions between presidents Trump and Xi. Achieving fair and reciprocal treatment for the companies is a shared objective," Ross said. However, observers are skeptical that the contracts can make a dent in the US' $347 billion annual trade deficit in goods with China. "We are hoping the contracts do not overshadow the need for structural changes in the economic relationship," said Bill Zarit, a former U.S. diplomat who now heads the American Chamber of Commerce in China. "There are ways for the Chinese to show they are addressing the deficit without addressing the structural issues." Mark Duval, president of Terex China, said of the deals: "I imagine these are mostly memoranda of understanding being signed today, but [the state visit] does increase the speed and the scale of deals." Just ahead of Trump's 11-day, five-nation tour of Asia, U.S. trade representative Robert Lighthizer promised a tougher approach. "We have tried it [China's] way for 25 years," Lighthizer told Fox News. "The result of their way [will be] a $750 billion goods deficit and an overall goods-and-services deficit of $500 billion. These are staggering numbers. We ought to try something else." President Donald Trump and China's President Xi Jinping leave after an opera performance at the Forbidden City in Beijing, China, November 8, 2017. President Donald Trump's entourage on his trip to Asia includes a pair of natural gas executives, a sign that the White House is eager to build on progress earlier this year to ship more of the fuel to China. Natural gas demand in China is rising and poised to boom in coming years as the world's second-largest economy aims to reduce its reliance on coal-fired power. The Trump administration is making it a priority to assure U.S. companies scoop up a significant share of the business. In May, the U.S. Commerce Department and Beijing reached an agreement that will allow Chinese firms to strike long-term contracts with American producers of liquefied natural gas. U.S. capacity to process LNG, or natural gas cooled to liquid form, is set to grow nearly seven-fold by 2019 as five export terminals open. Exporting more of that LNG is a central pillar of Trump's plan to achieve "energy dominance." The United States will have to compete with Qatar, Malaysia and Australia, which dominate global LNG sales, as well as Russia, which ships gas to China by way of pipeline. But there are signs that there's room for American suppliers in the fastest-growing market for LNG. American LNG shipments to China are rising this year, according to a report from the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission. The U.S. shipped $139 million of LNG to China in the first seven months of this year. That tops last year's total U.S. LNG exports to China of $137 million. The opportunity exists because U.S. transport costs to Asia are low right now, and Asian LNG prices have fallen to the weakest level in more than a decade. That is encouraging China to buy natural gas instead of coal. China's five-year economic plan calls for the country to use less coal and more natural gas to generate power. Despite the recent gains and the agreement with Trump, Chinese buyers are still only purchasing U.S. LNG from third parties in short-term spot trades. And there is currently only one company, Cheniere Energy , capable of exporting large shipments of LNG from the United States. Cheniere CEO Jack Fusco and Texas LNG Chief Operating Officer Langtry Meyer are joining the Trump delegation. The companies did not respond to questions about their agenda in China, but energy research firm Wood Mackenzie said securing commitments is likely at the top of Trump's list. "The fact that Trump will arrive in Beijing with a large business delegation in tow, including a sizeable contingent from the energy sector, indicates that the White House is looking to secure concrete commercial agreements from the upcoming trip," Kerry-Anne Shanks, head of Asia gas and LNG at Wood Mackenzie, said in an email briefing on Tuesday. Chinese natural gas demand could grow from 206 billion cubic meters last year to 330 billion cubic meters in 2020, according to Wood Mackenzie. The firm expects LNG to account for about a third of China's growing consumption through 2025. The United States has faced some obstacles but also boasts advantages in capturing part of that growth. On the one hand, Chinese LNG buyers can potentially find a better deal elsewhere and may not want to expose themselves to U.S. gas prices, said Hugo Brennan, Asia analyst at risk consultancy Verisk Maplecroft. There are also large fixed costs to liquefying and shipping LNG from the United States, and American companies will have to contend with lower-cost LNG expansions in Qatar and Australia, Brennan added. Shortly after the Commerce Department reached the agreement with China, Qatar announced plans to hike its natural gas exports 30 percent by 2024. Some analysts think China won't end up buying much LNG from the United States and will instead use the option to gain leverage over Qatar in price negotiations. But U.S. LNG shippers can offer customers more flexibility in terms of shipment volumes, and American deals have allowed buyers to sell off their purchases to others, Brennan notes. "China aims to maintain a well-diversified portfolio of gas suppliers and U.S. imports could help ensure that Beijing does not become too dependent on any one state. U.S. supplies could help reduce China's reliance on gas imports that transit strategic chokepoints," Brennan said in a note on Tuesday. Wood Mackenzie also flags growing cooperation between China and Russia, which can send natural gas to its southern neighbor through pipelines at a discount to U.S. overseas shipments. Despite the existence of latent pressure points, Sino-Russian ties have warmed considerably under Xi Jinping and there is a deal of synergy between Moscow's 'Pivot to Asia' and Beijing's 'Belt and Road Initiative,'" the firm says. "Energy cooperation has developed into the central plank of the bilateral relationship." Supply from China itself could also be an obstacle. China has the world's largest technically recoverable reserves of shale gas, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. By 2030, China could provide for about a third of its own gas needs, EIA projects. More from Global Investing Hot Spots: Trump targets US-China corporate deals on Beijing visit Iran-North Korea's 'axis of evil' may be Trump's biggest threat Saudi Arabia's political purge may actually improve the business climate, but comes with huge risk Uber signed a deal with NASA Wednesday to help develop traffic systems for its flying car project which it hopes to start testing in 2020. The ride-hailing service published details of its "on demand aviation" ambitions last year which it has called Uber Elevate. It is now stepping up its efforts to make the project a reality. Uber said at the Web Summit tech conference in Lisbon that it signed a Space Act Agreement with NASA for the development of "unmanned traffic management." This is NASA's push to figure out how unmanned aerial systems (UAS), such as drones that fly at a low altitude, can operate safely. Uber wants to make vertical take-off and landing vehicles. That will allow their flying cars to take off and land vertically. They will fly at a low altitude. This is the start-up's first partnership with a U.S. federal government agency. NASA is also working with other companies to develop traffic management for these low altitude vehicles. "UberAir will be performing far more flights on a daily basis than it has ever been done before. Doing this safely and efficiently is going to require a foundational change in airspace management technologies," Jeff Holden, chief product officer at Uber, said in a statement on Wednesday. "Combining Uber's software engineering expertise with NASA's decades of airspace experience to tackle this is a crucial step forward for Uber Elevate." The NASA deal is the latest in a series of partnerships Uber has struck to get UberAir which is what the new service is called off the ground. Earlier this year it said it was working with authorities in Dallas-Fort Worth and Dubai to bring its flying taxis to those cities. It also signed partnerships with aircraft manufacturers and real estate companies to figure out where the take off and landing sites for the flying cars could be. Uber said Wednesday that it also plans to trial the project in Los Angeles in 2020 along with the already announced cities. The company expects the price of a trip to be competitive with the same journey if done using UberX. It is aiming to get the flying taxi service up before the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles. U.S. stock index futures pointed to a slightly lower open on Wednesday, as investors readied to delve through another cluster of earnings from the U.S. corporate sphere. Politics is also expected to set a slight tone on Wall Street as U.S. President Donald Trump continues his journey abroad in Asia. On Wednesday, Trump continued to draw attention to the threat that North Korea poses to the rest of the world, as he traveled from South Korea to China. In an address to South Korean lawmakers, Trump said that Kim Jong-Un's regime "has interpreted America's past restraint as weakness." "This would be a fatal miscalculation. This is a very different administration than the United States has had in the past," said Trump, warning North Korea to "not underestimate us". On the data front, weekly mortgage applications volume remained unchanged from the previous week. Democrat Ralph Northam's victory in the Virginia governor's election tells us a lot about Virginia, but not much about anywhere else. Northam absolutely won a strong victory, especially since he nearly doubled the margin of victory his fellow Democrat Hillary Clinton earned in winning the state in the 2016 presidential election. And Northam was not alone as Democrats also won the elections for lieutenant governor, attorney general, and apparent control of the state House of Delegates. What's more, one of those victorious Democrats in a House of Delegates race was a transgender candidate who defeated a Republican incumbent who sponsored a bill restricting transgender people from using bathrooms of their choice in government buildings. The consensus take on the sweeping wins for the Democrats in the Old Dominion is that this is a repudiation of President Donald Trump, his policies, and his political tone. Not exactly. What the election results really prove without a doubt is that Virginia is now undeniably blue. The Democrats have won the state three straight times in presidential elections, four of the last five governor's elections, and the once solid red state even has two Democrats representing it in the U.S. Senate. The reasons this has happened are a series of demographic and political factors that were in motion long before Donald Trump became a candidate. On the demographic side, Virginia's non-white population grew from 22 percent of the population to 28 percent between 2009 and 2013. And the population is also getting younger. The size of the population ages 18-29 has jumped from just 15 percent to 19 percent since 2009. Both younger voters and non-white Americans are simply less statistically likely to vote for any Republican. Politically, Virginia has increasingly become a bastion for the establishment. Thanks to lucrative D.C.-area lobbying jobs and the rock-solid job security Virginia's large number of federal government workers enjoy, the state is chock full of residents who rely on Uncle Sam. And with the federal government still growing robustly over the past decades under both Republican and Democratic administrations, that establishment base is getting bigger. A significant portion of the population there doesn't like the sound of this outsider threatening their way of life. Imagine if Trump came into Michigan and bashed autoworkers, or showed up in Florida and bashed Social Security. Bashing the government and Washington insiders might work in many parts of America, but the growing population of Northern Virginia especially sees it as an understandable threat. In that sense, the Northam and other Democratic Party wins in Virginia are more of a continuation of the 2016 results in that state that went to Clinton in 2016 even as its neighbor North Carolina went for Barack Obama in 2008, and swung back to Trump last year. Virginia is simply different. The results also don't mean that Virginians of all backgrounds are rejecting the nastier political tone that both President Trump and his staunchest opponents continue to embrace. That opposite is true because there were plenty of new lows met in this race. A Latino group supporting Northam aired a controversial ad showing scared minority children being chased by a truck with a "Gillespie for governor" sticker and a Confederate flag. The Democratic Party in Virginia also sent out a mailer showing President Trump and Gillespie with pictures of white supremacists marchers inserted below them. And Gillespie repeatedly took a Trump-like tone in trying to tie the murderous MS-13 gang to policies Northam supports. That is not to say that the Trump team can just brush off Virginia's election results as a non-event. The excellent state-wide organization and get out the vote efforts definitely played a role in increasing Northam's margin of victory and swinging some of the close House of Delegate races. Those are key lessons the Democrats will surely try to bring to other states. And if there is a silent army of Trump supporters out there, it clearly wasn't big or strong enough to stem the anti-Trump tide in Virginia. No, Virginia cannot be considered a red or even a swing state anymore. The White House can only hope the story is different in states that aren't undergoing Virginia's unique series of changes. Commentary by Jake Novak, CNBC.com senior columnist. Follow him on Twitter @jakejakeny. For more insight from CNBC contributors, follow @CNBCopinion on Twitter. [This stream is slated to begin at 10 a.m. ET. Please refresh if you do not see the feed.] The former CEOs of Yahoo and Equifax companies which were hit with two of the biggest data breaches of all time will be probed by senators on Wednesday about the state of America's cybersecurity defenses. The pair will appear before the Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, alongside current executives at Equifax and Yahoo-parent Verizon . Yahoo revealed last month that every account 3 billion in all was affected by a 2013 data breach. The revelation built on previous disclosures that more than 1 billion accounts were hacked. Hackers stole email addresses, passwords, birth dates, telephone numbers and more in the attack, but did not access passwords in clear text, payment card data or information about bank accounts. Two Russian intelligence agents and two other people have been indicted in connection with the attack of at least 500 million Yahoo accounts. At least 145.5 million U.S. consumers were affected by a separate attack on credit reporting company Equifax, an attack that has already been scrutinized heavily by regulators. CNBC's Todd Haselton and Liz Moyer contributed to this report. Closely followed tech analyst Mark Mahaney told CNBC on Wednesday he was wrong about Snap after the social network company's huge third-quarter revenue miss. "We downgraded the stock to a hold last night," said Mahaney, RBC Capital Markets' lead internet analyst. "We've had a buy on it since $24. We've had the wrong call on the stock." "This company showed less visibility into its revenue than we thought was possible," Mahaney told "Squawk Box." "Halfway through the quarter last quarter ... they said they could grow revenue $60 million sequentially from the June quarter, September quarter. They came in about a third lower than that." Mahaney also said the company's daily average users came in "light," and he said the report lacked any positive engagement metrics. "It was kind of three strikes for us," Mahaney said. Shares of the parent company behind Snapchat sank as much as 20 percent in after-hours trading following its quarterly earnings report. The stock later pared losses, to trade about 11 percent lower premarket Wednesday, after Chinese internet giant Tencent said has taken a roughly 10 percent stake in the company. Mahaney says Tencent probably chose "the least worst asset" with Snap instead of going with a company like Twitter . "There's no question this asset has strategic value. It has a very strong lock on millennials," he said. Also on "Squawk Box," analyst James Cakmak, who is neutral on the Snap stock, said a lot the problems the company has seen are "self-inflicted." "You're a company with 178 million engaged users. If you're not extracting the value from them, by definition, that's your fault," said Cakmak, tech analyst at Monness, Crespi, Hardt. Disclosure: CNBC parent NBCUniversal is an investor in Snap. Investors need to back more entrepreneurs from outside Silicon Valley to create jobs in areas of the U.S. that have felt left out by the advance of technology, AOL co-founder Steve Case told CNBC on Wednesday. Case, who is CEO of venture capital firm Revolution, said earlier this year that California, Massachusetts and New York captured 75 percent of venture capital last year. This is a problem as many feel left out of the technology revolution, he added, so venture capitalists need to invest in companies in other parts of the U.S. "We are seeing in this third wave of the internet entrepreneurship both regionalized and globalized... So Silicon Valley is great and will continue to be great, but I think we've probably hit peak Silicon Valley and we need to figure out ways to have a more diverse, inclusive innovation economy," Case told CNBC in a TV interview. Democratic candidate Phil Murphy celebrates with his running mate, Lieutenant Governor-elect Sheila Oliver, after he was elected Governor of New Jersey, in Asbury Park, New Jersey, U.S., November 7, 2017. In a political era marked by populism, a former Goldman Sachs executive and major Democratic donor on Tuesday easily won New Jersey's election for governor. Democrat Phil Murphy defeated Republican Kim Guadagno, the state's lieutenant governor. In January, he will replace highly unpopular Republican Gov. Chris Christie, whose reputation was seen as hampering Guadagno. Murphy, 60, had to defend his more than 20 years at Goldman while pushing a progressive platform. He is focusing partly on boosting the working class and holding Wall Street firms in check. Murphy is also trying to avoid the shadow of the state's last Democratic governor, the unpopular Jon Corzine, who was Goldman's CEO before becoming a New Jersey politician. In his victory speech Tuesday night, Murphy said he would first focus on "creating a stronger and fairer economy that works for all" of New Jersey's residents. "We will rebuild our state from the bottom up and the middle out," Murphy said. "And we will ask those at the very top to do their fair share. That means a higher minimum wage, equal pay for equal work. Tax fairness and the real property tax relief that our middle class and seniors so desperately need." Guadagno had cast Murphy as an out-of-touch "Goldman Sachs millionaire," but the association appeared to do little to hamper his chances. Still, it remains to be seen how Murphy's Goldman past will affect his ability to enact worker-driven policy in New Jersey. Before the election, Murphy's allies saw a candidate who knows how to fix capitalism's flaws due to his work at the top reaches of the U.S. economy. "I think he sees himself differently from some of the people who succeeded on Wall Street. I just think he sees the world differently than a lot of people on Wall Street do," said Howard Dean, the former Vermont governor who chaired the Democratic National Committee when Murphy led its finance arm. The Murphy campaign did not respond to CNBC's requests for an interview or comment. Associations with Goldman or other Wall Street firms have opened candidates to attacks in recent races. In last year's presidential election, President Donald Trump targeted both Democratic rival Hillary Clinton and Republican primary opponent Sen. Ted Cruz for connections to the firm. Democrats have since hit Trump for filling the top ranks of the executive branch with wealthy former Goldman officials. After the surprise success of Sen. Bernie Sanders' populist presidential campaign and struggles in 2016 national elections, the Democratic Party appeared set to embrace more progressive candidates. Both Democrat and Republican rivals in the governor's race criticized Murphy for failing to fit that mold due to his wealth amassed at Goldman. After joining the Wall Street titan in the early 1980s, Murphy spent more than 20 years there. During his career, he led the firm's Frankfurt, Germany, office and served as president of its Asia division. At Goldman, Murphy was reportedly renowned for his deal-making ability, which helped him advance through the company. His work in Asia, though, has sparked controversy. An investigation by The Star-Ledger newspaper in New Jersey showed that his division profited from an investment in a shoe manufacturer that had dismal working conditions. Murphy's campaign denied he had a role in Goldman making the initial investment. Before and after leaving Goldman in the mid-2000s, Murphy gave millions of his personal fortune to Democratic candidates and national and state party committees. He served as the party's finance chairman from 2006 to 2009, where he worked closely with Dean. Dean said he liked Murphy "instantly" the first time he met him. He described Murphy as charismatic and smart and said he listens and manages people well. After his DNC role, Murphy became the U.S. ambassador to Germany from 2009 to 2013. As a diplomat, he faced backlash over his sharp criticism of German officials in documents published by WikiLeaks. In one instance, he called German Chancellor Angela Merkel "insecure." Murphy's campaign largely downplayed his work at Goldman, his role in Germany and his past as a major Democratic fundraiser. The next New Jersey governor instead highlighted his working-class upbringing. His campaign website says he made his way through Harvard University by working part-time jobs and taking out loans. Guadagno repeatedly cast Murphy as unable to identify with the average voter due to his wealth. At a debate last month, she called him a "Goldman Sachs millionaire" and tied him to Corzine, the state's "last Goldman Sachs governor." Corzine lost his 2009 re-election bid to Christie as the New Jersey economy reeled during the Great Recession. Ahead of the election, the attacks on Murphy's Goldman past resonated little with voters, according to Patrick Murray, director of the Monmouth University Polling Institute. Murphy entered the race as a relative unknown, so Guadagno faced a challenge in educating voters about his past at the firm and then making them care about it, he said. Guadagno struggled to "make as much hay out of Murphy's past perhaps as she could have," Murray said. In a Monmouth poll last month, only 28 percent of New Jersey voters said they associated Murphy with his Goldman career. Some 34 percent said they were unaware that he worked there. And 70 percent of voters said his Goldman work would have no effect on their choice for governor. As a Republican, Guadagno likely faced more headwinds because of Christie's dismally low approval rating, Murray added. Murphy struck a progressive tone in his campaign. Among other policies, he has called for investments in infrastructure and colleges, raising the minimum wage and mandating earned sick leave. Murphy is pushing for creating a public bank and divesting New Jersey pension funds from hedge funds and private equity. He has also called for a "millionaire's tax" and more aggressive prosecution of financial fraud. Dean contended that Murphy's experience on Wall Street has shown him why a progressive platform is necessary. Said Dean: "Sometimes, it takes someone who knows capitalism to fix it. I think Phil completely gets that because he's been on both ends of that." Your best friend could be a key contributor to your success. According to new research, which was presented at the British Psychological Society annual conference in May, having a close friend boosts your resilience and helps you bounce back from hardshipsa necessary skill if you want to be successful. For the preliminary study, 75 participants took assessments on their psychological resilience, coping behaviors, self-esteem and their relationship with the person they consider a best friend. One year later, the participants completed the same assessment "to see how best friendship quality had impacted resilience processes over this period." The researchers found that those who had higher resilience the next year had a greater quality of friendship. Though researchers don't why that is, the study notes that best friends are a "protective mechanism" and having one can help you make it through tough times. However, just because friends can positively influence your career doesn't mean you need a large entourage. As a matter of fact, you should be trimming and tweaking your social circle as you move up in your career, says psychologist Cicely Horsham-Brathwaite. On the flip side, she says, making time for supportive and solid relationships is crucial because these types of friendships help you grow. Look no further than billionaire besties Warren Buffett and Bill Gates to understand that who you decide to be friends with can greatly influence your career. The billionaires say that they automatically clicked when they first met. For the last 25 years, they've bounced business ideas off each other and discussed trends in their respective industries. "It began a really unbelievable friendship for me," Gates told students at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln's College of Business Administration in 2005. "I could tell that even though we came from different directions, the kinds of things that fascinated us and that we thought were important were very much the same." Buffett highlights the importance of choosing a friend wisely in a recent conversation with Gates at Columbia University. "You will move in the direction of the people that you associate with," he says, "It's important to associate with people that are better than yourself." The Microsoft co-founder adds that you should treat your social circle like an investment. "Some friends do bring out the best in you," he says, "and so it's good to invest in those friendships." Like this story? Like CNBC Make It on Facebook. See also: Why the secret to your success is who you marry Here's how helping your co-workers may be hurting your success Here's how millennials feel about the next generation entering the workforce 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. The Cafe Domenica, ten minutes walk down the Greenway from Brighton Station, is a happy place to discuss a sad problem. I arrived early for my meeting, and sat with a cappuccino and an almond croissant, enjoying the atmosphere. The snack was delicious once it came, but paying for it took a long time, because the woman working the electronic till suffered from learning difficulties. But the sympathetic manner in which her colleague explained the machine to her abolished impatience. One felt oneself drawn into world where kindness and respect resumed their proper importance, and the feverish desire to get things done instantaneously faded away. Rosa Monckton arrived. The cafe is her idea, but she speaks here in a personal capacity, and as a mother, rather than as the founder of Team Domenica, a social enterprise charity set up to help people with learning difficulties find work. Her own daughter, Domenica, suffers from such difficulties, having been born with Downs Syndrome. Monckton some years ago made a film, Letting Go, about the predicament of the parents of such children, who provide indispensable care for them, and cannot help wondering, What will become of them when we are dead? One way most children can hope to find themselves integrated into wider society is by going out and finding work. For people with learning difficulties, this is much harder, because they are not, in economic terms, as productive as their contemporaries, so about 93 per cent of them are unemployed. Earlier this year, Monckton wrote a piece for The Spectator, in which she pointed out that the minimum wage is one of the obstacles which stand in the way of people like her daughter, who would benefit enormously from the sense of purpose which comes from having a job, but who cannot be useful enough to an employer to justify that rate of pay. ConHome: Can I start by asking whether you got any satisfactory response to your Spectator piece, which made the point about the minimum wage very powerfully, and said that people have had terrible abuse hurled at them when they said that maybe the minimum wage is not helpful. Monckton: I have never been at the receiving end of such vitriol, ever in my life. ConHome: After that piece? From whom? I mean Monckton: The physical disability lobby, who thought I was talking about them, which I was very clear that I wasnt. From major charities, who represent people with learning disabilities, saying how could I say that people with a learning disability are worth less than people without. And I said thats absolutely not what Im saying, and I dont like valuing people in monetary terms, and this is about self-worth and the reason to be employed. I mean its an absolute right to have employment, to feel good about yourself, to have reason to get out of bed, and I feel that very strongly. However on the plus side, I had hundreds of emails from parents saying, Youre absolutely right, my son or my daughter is sitting at home, theyre perfectly capable of doing something, people are not prepared to pay them the minimum wage. Also very interesting from employers. One in particular who said, I employ 10,000 people. My conscience tells me I should have a hundred with learning disabilities. However were not a charity and we cant do it, my shareholders wouldnt let me, but youre absolutely right. I really didnt want to talk about this today, because we are a charity and Im not allowed to lobby and Im a trustee, so I have to be really, really careful. ConHome: So youre not speaking on behalf of the charity. Youre speaking on behalf of yourself. Monckton: Absolutely. And its not something I want to go on about. ConHome: Well someone needs to go on about it. But I see it cant be you. Monckton: But its outrageous. It truly is. You can see what theyre all capable of here. ConHome: But theres so much of an idea, even more today I think than in the past, that at work you must fill the unforgiving minute with sixty seconds worth of distance run, and youve got to do everything as quickly as possible, and if you can serve ten customers instead of nine the cafe will be more profitable. But your people who learn about work here cant possibly serve coffee at the incredible speed of some brilliant young Italian whos got a degree from Bologna University and is just in London for a bit of fun, and is earning some money to pay their way. Monckton: Whats good about this is weve only been here since September, we have incredible support from the local community, really fantastic, its doing so much better than we anticipated in our business plan The reason Ive come from next door is that Eagle Labs are next door, the Barclays Bank thing, they let us use their place for meetings, were catering for some of their meetings. Everybody has been so open-hearted and understanding. And actually a couple came in last week. It took a bit of time, sometimes, you know, there are lots of accidents that happen, and she said to me as she left, Were always going to come here. When I go to Starbucks, Im spending money. When I come here, I leave a little bit of my soul. ConHome: So its a quite different transaction. Monckton: A completely different transaction. Its sort of joyous. ConHome: I think there are lots of people who want to help but dont know how to set about it, and they dont feel they can take on some colossal commitment, but they can do a little. Monckton: But the cafes a small part of what we do. Weve got 31 candidates this year. Weve got a training centre upstairs. A lot of them are out in supported internships. A lot of them are out in work experience. ConHome: Does someone go with them? Monckton: With the supported internships, yes. With job experience, no. So we are trying to raise money to pay for job buddies to go with them. And we have got six [from the first years intake of 21 people] into paid employment, a few hours a week, which is fantastic. Two are working in the Co-op. One is working in a doughnut kiosk on Brighton pier. One is in the cafe at the University of Sussex. And two are in the Grand Hotel, one in the cafe and one in housekeeping. Nobody more than 12 hours a week and some two hours a week. But its the first time theyve had money coming in and felt brilliant about themselves. So weve already busted the national average. ConHome: Which is still about 93 per cent unemployment among people with learning disabilities? Monckton: Yes. ConHome: It is very, very sad. Monckton: Sad is exactly the word. And when Im talking about the national minimum wage, a therapeutic exemption already exists for piece workers who are slower in their output than anybody else. That exemption exists. All I am saying is why dont we use that. So why dont we look at the people who are in the top level of employment support allowance, which all of our candidates here would be, i.e. not assumed to be capable of employment, and do a little test case. So Im not saying take it away from anybody. Give people who havent got a wage a chance, just to see if that would make a difference in getting them into a job. ConHome: The word therapeutic immediately helps to explain the idea. Monckton: Well it should, but it doesnt seem to. And then when I went onto the Politics Show, they do this thing Soap Box, and they came down and they interviewed me, and I explained what I meant. And then I was in a studio with Caroline Flint and Eric Pickles. They watched the film thats been made, and I had thought that perhaps Eric Pickles would be concerned, but I saw his face when he was watching it, and I knew he wouldnt. Its a sacred cow, without anybody understanding. Im not saying remove it. Im not saying that people with physical disabilities shouldnt be paid the minimum wage. Of course they should. ConHome: If youre going to keep the wage, youd have to put an obligation on employers to employ a certain proportion of people with learning disabilities. Monckton: Which they do in France, which they do in most European countries, and which we dont do here. ConHome: Hows your daughter getting on? Monckton: Shes here somewhere. Well meet her later. Shes very happy here, very happy. And what weve created, which was completely unexpected, is a community. And I think this whole thing of mainstreaming means that very few of them came here with friends. Because we all want a peer group. You want people who have the same interests as you, the same level of intellect as you. And if youre mainstreaming, and you have a teaching assistant glued to your side, youre not really going to make friends. When Domenica was at mainstream school, she didnt really make any friends. Nobody included her in parties. We invited everybody to birthday parties and she was never asked back. ConHome: Oh Lord, yes. Monckton: And thats horrible. ConHome: So youre in fact learning more about what works and what is needed by doing this. Monckton: Absolutely. Theyve all got a Facebook group now. Many of them went to a Halloween party last week. Amazing photographs, all of them together. And thats so wonderful. Theyve got a social life outside of here, which they didnt have before. And thats really nice. I mean obviously all with their carers, those who need carers, but it works. Its building a community. You know, this was the whole Jean Vanier thing. You have to build a community. And everybody has the right to belong, and the need to belong. Its a basic human need. And the loneliness and isolation of people with learning disabilities is profound. And its just a question of listening and as you said, just stopping the rushing, and just being for a bit. And theres so much to learn. I mean Domenicas taught me so many things about what matters. And there are so many different ways of communicating. Its not just about speech. Loving someone is so easy even a child can do it. ConHome: I suppose if youre surrounded by people many of whom are quite like yourself, youre not feeling continually outshone, or the odd one out, who cant do what everyone else can do. Monckton: Youre not sitting in the corridor because its maths and its one of the things you cant understand. And youre achieving things. Domenica can now make a cup of coffee on her own on the barista machine. Thats fantastic. ConHome: Also its something that carries on. You said in that film, everyone who has a child with learning difficulties thinks, What will happen when Im no longer there? Youre confronted by your own mortality. Monckton: Yes, and thats the really, really difficult thing. Where is Domenica going to live? Whos going to look after her? And now we have to be thinking of that. It is difficult for employers. Its a huge commitment. It requires an understanding that this person is not going to have the output that everybody else does. However what they bring is a humanity to the workplace. They are going to be incredibly loyal, delighted to be at work, no backstabbing, no climbing a corporate ladder, all of those things. Its complicated. Very, very, very, very complicated. And I have to work out whether, because we want to roll this out, and London is what Im going to be planning next year, do we just start a chain of cafes? ConHome: Do you have some gleam of an idea of some other kind of enterprise? Monckton: No. Everybody here is on a pathway to employment. Thats the plan. And of our 21 last year we got six in. This year weve got 32. What happens to those who are clearly not going to? I do not want to set anybody up to fail. If I could find a sustainable way of running the cafe if I could find someone in London whod give us somewhere rent-free, you know, one of those big landlords, the Westminster Estate, the Portman Estate. ConHome: Message to the Duke of Westminster. Monckton: Exactly. How many readers do you have? The legend among Labours growing band of anti-semites is that Israel is uniquely able to further its interests in Britain. The truth is that no foreign affairs issue is as contested here as Israel-Palestine, and frenzied partisans are to be found on both sides of the argument. The Left has become increasingly pro-Palestine as time has passed, though there is a lively Labour Friends of Israel movement. Conservative Friends of Israel is a bigger beast, because much of the Right is pro-Israel, though there is a determined pro-Palestine presence on the Tory backbenches. The irony of Patels personal outreach to Israels Government and politicians, therefore, is that all it has achieved is to advance the viewpoint of that countrys enemies. The International Development Secretary has been driven this morning to the verge of resignation by a second installment of the story. It has emerged that she reportedly held two unauthorised meetings with, respectively, an Israeli Minister and diplomat after her return from that country, in addition to the four politicians, including Benjamin Netanyahu, that she met while on holiday on Israel earlier this year without previously notifying Downing Street or the Foreign Office. Patel was apparently accompanied in these latest meetings, as in previous ones, by Stuart Polak, the honorary president of Conservative Friends of Israel. The Michael Fallon affair couldnt be more different from the Patel controversy, but it had a point in common: it was a reminder that a senior politician can usually survive one big negative story, but not two (or more). Furthermore, the International Development Secretary has already been compelled to concede, in cold print, that she erred in reacting to the first set of claims first by suggesting that Boris Johnson knew about her meetings in advance, which he didnt, and second by implying that no more had taken place than those originally reported. There were twelve in total, including various charitable visits. That cant have left much time for the holiday during which these engagements took place. This site cannot remember an occasion on which a Cabinet Minister, or indeed any Minister at all, had their mistakes highlighted on their own departments website. This development, plus the briefing that Patel was given a dressing-down in person by the Prime Minister, suggests that the former would have been sacked by now were the latter in a stronger position. But ultimately the fate of a single politician matters less than that of a country of which Britain is an ally, if sometimes a critical one. By their nature, policians are, as Robin Day once put it to John Nott, here today, gone tomorrow. Israel will last rather longer than that, as will its engagement with our interests. There is no claim that the Israeli Government knew that the International Development Secretary was freelancing. And it will presumably not need reminding though some of its friends here apparently do that it is compelled to be especially careful. It has longstanding concerns about the Governments funding of the Palestinian Authority, and Patel recently froze aid to it pending a review, following claims that taxpayers money was finding its way into the hands of convicted terrorists. There will have been unhappiness within her own department at the decision. Israel also has a longstanding complaint and not an unreasonable one about UK funding of hate education in the Authoritys schools. The facts could be read as suggesting that the International Development Secretary was constructing an alternative policy, having met departmental resistance to her wishes. There is an oddity in that she does not seem specifically to have breached the Ministerial Code of Conduct, which means either that Downing Street and senior civil servants will move to make it more specific, or that they will prefer to keep it vague (because that gives them more room for manouevre). But government becomes incoherent if Ministers freelance in this way. Patel is a brave woman with clear-cut views we applauded her decision to risk her career by coming out for Brexit but there is a point at which determination can ossify into stubborness. Either way, these unauthorised meetings have been a blunder. It looks fatal. For all its faults, Israel remains the only liberal democracy in the Middle East complete with that nexus of free elections, independent judges, an outspoken media, sexual freedoms and a flourishing civil society that make it so. It is part of the Western enterprise despite its geography. This helps to explains why the adolescent Left hates it, and why Labour is now in the grip of institutional anti-semitism. But its interests are not identical with Britains, since no other countrys can be particularly since its future as a democracy is not guaranteed. The lesson of the Patel affair is that its friends should bear this in mind. Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings (NCLH) has no plans to make adjustments in China, and NCLH China President David J. Herrera made it clear where the company stands in a speech at this week's China Cruise Shipping event in Sanya. "The most important fact is our commitment to China," Herrera said. "We are proud that we are here today, tomorrow and throughout the future. We are committed to the Chinese market. We are excited about sales for our 2018 itineraries and we have already begun planning our 2019 itineraries." Herrera's comments follow the news of many other cruise lines making capacity adjustments in 2018 in China. He did not make any reference to Norwegian's 2019 newbuild, which has been allocated for deployment in China. The Norwegian Joy, built for the Chinese market, arrived in Shanghai earlier in the year and remains year-round in the market. Recent promotions in October and November by Norwegian in China offered free WeChat access, as well as other incentives for booking remaining 2017 inventory aboard the Joy. Herrera also pointed out that the company's other brands are important to its operation in China, as a group of Chinese travelers recently chartered a Regent ship for a 12-day sailing in Europe, which marked the first full-ship charter by a Chinese group for the Regent brand. --- For insight and in-depth analysis of the Chinese cruise market, download the 2018 China Market Report. About the 2018 China Market Report The 2018 China Market Report by Cruise Industry News is the only resource covering the future trajectory of the Chinese and Asia-Pacific cruise industry, presenting the past, present and future in a concise 95-plus page PDF download. It is the only forward looking and independently-researched data available on the Chinese cruise market. Cruise Industry News profiles all the major cruise lines operating in Asia, from Carnival Corporation to Royal Caribbean and local operators. In addition, there are discussions with leading Chinese travel agents about the charter model and pricing trends, port news and updates from across the region, and a look at the fleet of ships in Asia through 2027. There is also exclusive analysis and statistics of the Asia-Pacific market going back to 1998 and supply projections through 2027, in addition to a break-down of Asia-Pacific and China by operator and market capacity. Click here to learn more. Quantum cryptography definition Quantum cryptography, also called quantum encryption, applies principles of quantum mechanics to encrypt messages in a way that it is never read by anyone outside of the intended recipient. It takes advantage of quantums multiple states, coupled with its "no change theory," which means it cannot be unknowingly interrupted. Performing these tasks requires a quantum computer, which have the immense computing power to encrypt and decrypt data. A quantum computer could quickly crack current public-key cryptography. Why quantum cryptography is important Companies and governments around the world are in a quantum arms race, the race to build the first usable quantum computer. The technology promises to make some kinds of computing problems much, much easier to solve than with todays classical computers. One of those problems is breaking certain types of encryption, particularly the methods used in todays public key infrastructure (PKI), which underlies practically all of todays online communications. Im certainly scared of what can be the result of quantum computing, says Michael Morris, CEO at Topcoder, a global network of 1.4 million developers. Topcoder is part of Wipro, a global consulting organization. Its also working on finding solutions to quantum computing programming challenges. Instead of solving one problem at a time, with quantum computing we can solve thousands of problems at the same processing speed, with the same processing power, Morris says. Things that would take hundreds of days today could take just hours on a quantum computer. The commercial quantum computers available today are still far from being able to do that. The theories have advanced farther than the hardware, says William Hurley, IEEE senior member, founder and CEO of Austin-based quantum computing company Strangeworks. However, we shouldnt wait for the hardware to motivate the switch to post-quantum cryptography. Who knows what kind of technology isnt available on the public market, or is operated in secret by foreign governments? My fear is that we wont know that the quantum computer capable of doing this even exists until its done, says Topcoders Morris. My fear is that it happens before we know its there. Asymmetric versus symmetric encryption Heres how encryption works on traditional computers: Binary digits (0s and 1s) are systematically sent from one place to another and then deciphered with a symmetric (private) or asymmetric (public) key. Symmetric key ciphers like Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) use the same key for encrypting a message or file, while asymmetric ciphers like RSA use two linked keys private and public. The public key is shared, but the private key is kept secret to decrypt the information. The first target of encryption-breaking quantum computers will be the weakest link in the encryption ecosystem: asymmetric encryption. This is PKI, the RSA encryption standard. Emails, websites, financial transactions and pretty much everything is protected with asymmetric encryption. The reason its popular is that anyone can encrypt a message by using the intended recipients public key, but only the recipient can decrypt it using the matching private key. The two-key approach relies on the principle that some kinds of mathematical processes are much easier to do than to undo. You can crack an egg, but putting it back together is a lot harder. With symmetric encryption, messages are encrypted and decrypted using the same key. That makes symmetric encryption less suitable for public communication but significantly harder to break. Quantum computers are unlikely to crack symmetric methods (AES, 3DES, etc.) but are likely to crack public methods, such as ECC and RSA, says Bill Buchanan, professor in the School of Computing at Edinburgh Napier University in Scotland. The internet has often overcome problems in cracking within an increase in key sizes, so I do expect a ramp up in key sizes to extend the shelf life for RSA and ECC. How to defend against quantum cryptography Longer keys are the first line of defense against quantum encryption, and pretty much everybody is on board with that. In fact, the 1024-bit version of the RSA encryption standard is no longer regarded as safe by NIST, which recommends 2048 bits as a minimum. Longer keys make encryption slower and more costly, however, and the key length will have to increase substantially to stay ahead of quantum computers. Another option is to use symmetric encryption for the messages themselves, then use asymmetric encryption just for the keys. This is the idea behind the Transport Layer Security (TLS) online standard, says Alan Woodward, a professor at the department of computing at the University of Surrey. Many researchers are also looking at ways to create new kinds of encryption algorithms that would still allow public and private keys but be proof against quantum computers. For example, its easy to multiply two prime numbers together but very difficult to break a large number back up into its prime factors. Quantum computers can do it, and there are already known quantum techniques that could solve the factoring problem and many similar approaches, says Woodward. However, theres no known quantum method to crack lattice-based encryption, which uses cryptographic algorithms built around lattices. Lattice cryptography is the one that looks to be the favorite at the moment, simply because its the most practical to implement, he says. The best solution could be a combination of post-quantum algorithms like lattice-based encryption for the initial communication to securely exchange keys, then using symmetric encryption for the main messages. Can we really rely on lattice-based encryption or similar algorithms to be safe? You cant guarantee that your post-quantum algorithm will be secure against a future quantum computer that uses some unknown quantum algorithm, says Brian La Cour, professor and research scientist at the University of Texas. Quantum key distribution is unhackable, in theory This is where the laws of quantum physics can come to the rescue. Quantum key distribution (QKD) is a method of sending encryption keys using some very peculiar behaviors of subatomic particles that is, in theory at least, completely unhackable. The land-based version of QKD is a system where photons are sent one at a time through a fiberoptic line. If anyone is eavesdropping, then, according to the principles of quantum physics, the polarization of the photons is affected, and the recipient can tell that the message isnt secure. China is furthest ahead with QKD, with dedicated pipes connecting Beijing, Shanghai, and other cities. There are also networks in Europe. In the United States, the first commercial QKD network went live this past fall. The Quantum Xchange, connecting New York Citys financial firms with its data centers in New Jersey, rents space on existing fiberoptic networks, then uses its own QKD senders and receivers to send the secure messages on behalf of clients. The company plans to expand to Boston and Washington, D.C. later in 2019. However, the technology is extremely slow and requires expensive equipment to send and receive the individual photons. According to John Prisco, CEO and president of Quantum Xchange, a customer would need to buy a transmitter and a receiver, each of which costs in the neighborhood of $100,000. Its not too terribly different from other high-speed fiber optics communication equipment, he says. And the price will come down over time as more companies provide the hardware. The big breakthrough last year was that QKD systems no longer require special pipes, says Woodward. Now it looks like theyll be able to use existing fiber networks, so they dont have to lay new fiber. Then theres the satellite-based approach. This one uses the principle of entanglement, which Einstein called spooky action at a distance and refused to believe was real. Turns out, it is real, and China has had a quantum communication satellite up and working for a couple of years now. Entanglement isnt about instantaneous communications that break the speed of light speed limit, says Woodward. The way that it works is that two particles become entangled so that they have the same state, and then one of these particles is sent to someone else. When the recipient looks at the particle, its guaranteed to be the same state as its twin. If one of those particles changes, it doesnt mean that the other particle instantly changes to match its not a communication system. Plus, the state of the two entangled particles, while identical, is also random. So, you cant send a message, says Woodward, but you can send an encryption key, because what you really want in a key is a sequence of random digits. Now that the sender and the receiver both have the same random key, they can then use it to send messages using symmetric encryption over traditional channels. China has leapfrogged everyone with this satellite, says Woodward. Everyone said it couldnt be done, that passing through the atmosphere would drop it out of superposition, but the Chinese have been able to do it. To receive the signals, companies would need to put something that looks like a telescope on their rooftops, he says, and then install some processing equipment. Neither ground-based nor satellite-based quantum key distribution is practical for general use since both require very specialized and expensive equipment. It could, however, be useful for securing the most critical and sensitive communications. The limits of quantum key distribution If the integrity of the keys can be perfectly guaranteed by QKD, does that mean that unhackable communications are within our reach? Not so fast. Most hackers, when they break into things, they hardly go head-on, says Woodward. They go around the side, and I suspect that's where you'll find problems with these implementations. Todays attackers, while they could, in theory, listen in to traffic over fiberoptic lines, typically dont do that. There are far easier ways to read the messages, such as getting to the messages before they are encrypted or after they are decrypted or using man-in-the-middle attacks. Plus, QKD requires the use of relays. Unless the sender and the recipient build a pipe that goes directly between their two offices, and the distance is short enough that the messages dont degrade about 60 miles or less with current technology there will be plenty of opportunities for hackers. QKD networks will need repeaters when messages travel long distances. You can imagine that those repeaters are going to become weak points, says Woodward. Someone could hack in and get the key. In addition, QKD networks will need to be able to route messages, and that means routers and hubs, each of which is also a potential point of vulnerability. Physicists can say, this is absolutely secure, says Woodward, but theres a danger in that, in thinking that just because youre using QKD that youre secure. Sure, the laws of physics apply, but there might be ways around them. Besides the security problems, its not realistic to expect that every internet user will have access to an QKD endpoint anywhere in the near future. That means, except for the most sensitive, high-value communications, better encryption algorithms are the way to go. When will quantum cryptography become available? So how much time do we have to get those algorithms in place? When are the quantum computers getting here? Nobody knows, says Woodward, since very significant engineering challenges still need to be overcome, and that could take years or decades to solve. The technology is still in its infancy, he says. The quantum computer I play with over ihe internet via IBM now has 20 qubits, he says. Google is talking about 50 qubits. Cracking todays standard RSA encryption would take thousands of qubits. Adding those qubits isnt easy because theyre so fragile. Plus, quantum computers today have extremely high error rates, requiring even more qubits for error correction. I teach a class on quantum computing, says University of Texass La Cour. Last semester, we had access to one of IBMs 16-qubit machines. I was intending to do some projects with it to show some cool things you could do with a quantum computer. That didnt work out, he says. The device was so noisy that if you did anything complicated enough to require 16 qubits, the result was pure garbage. Once that scalability problem is solved, well be well on our way to having usable quantum computers, he says, but its impossible to put a timeframe on it. Its like saying back in the '70s, if you can solve the magnetic confinement problem, how far away is fusion? La Cour guesses that were probably decades away from the point at which quantum computers can be used to break todays RSA encryption. Theres plenty of time to upgrade to newer encryption algorithms except for one thing. Tech giants Facebook, Google, and Twitter found themselves squarely in the crosshairs of lawmakers last week as representatives from the three companies went before the U.S. Senate to testify. Republicans and Democrats put up a unified front against the tech giants. Questions of free speech, censorship, fake news and the possibility that the 2016 presidential election was influenced by Russia were all part of the hearings. In addition to concerns over private interests and foreign powers influencing public opinion with massive propaganda campaigns, lawmakers also showed concern about illicit and illegal behavior like human trafficking and fraud. In a recent poll conducted by Axios.com, between 28 and 29% of consumers view Facebook and Twitter either somewhat unfavorably or very unfavorably, a far worse opinion than of other major tech firms. The survey found Facebooks biggest public relations problems is fake news, while Twitters is bots pretending to be usersincluding the Russian troll bots that help Russian propaganda become trending topics. Recognizing the writing on the wall, Facebook plans to double its safety and security team from 20,000 to 40,000 people by the end of 2018. However, Facebook and Twitter arent the only brands on trial. Lawmakers are also concerned that search engines, online marketplaces, and the digital ad ecosystem enable bad actors like human traffickers, spammers, identity thieves, and credit card fraudsters. Even before the hearings, Congress had been working on new legislation. Perhaps the most draconian example is the Stop Enabling Sex Trafficking Act, which endeavors to hold sites and apps legally responsible for content that enables sex trafficking on their platforms. The hearings also put a spotlight on the Honest Ads Act, which holds publishers responsible for building better ad transparency, including disclosing the advertisers. Moving forward, we can bet that there will be increased scrutiny over tech firms ability to police user-generated content and third-party digital ads published on their web and mobile properties. If your company is part of this ecosystem, it would be wise to prepare for more governmental scrutiny and new regulations. To keep your organization ahead of the curve, the first thing you should consider is corporate culture and ensuring good Trust and Safety practices are embedded at every level. Arguably the most important challenge is to inject trust and safety into the product development lifecycle. It cant be understated how important it is that products are built with safety and security from day one. How are you handling user reporting? It is your best early warning system and a great resource for catching trends. Too many companies ignore their users at their own peril. In terms of creating or managing a Trust and Safety program, your goal is to be proactively shutting down bad behavior. Too many companies are reactive. A week is simply too long, you want to be addressing issues as close to real time as possible. To be proactive, you need a way to zoom out and see things on a macro level, so you can see trends in aggregate. Let's say youre a social network and you catch an actor using the platform to spread SPAM messages to other users. How can you be certain shutting down that profile solves the problem? What is stopping them from creating a new profile and coming back as a different user? You want a platform that can show you related entities (e.g. multiple users coming from a single device), so you can shut down repeat offenders once and for all. One of the most important features of a Trust and Safety program is the human element. Keep humans in the loop! While machine learning and automation are very important attributes of a proactive program, humans need to be involved to reclassify events to stay ahead of the dynamic threats you face. In the war against bad actors nothing is more potent than a knowledgeable analyst, that knows your industry, and who is armed with highly enriched, timely, and accurate data. Because these people are rare, their time is critical. They need a system that will give them a constant stream of bad user signals, in the context of the behavior or threat theyre tracking in near realtime. You cant afford to have these people sifting through reams of useless data looking for a needle in a haystack. Finally, get smart people who can create rules tailored to your policies. Enable these people with a platform that has its own rules engine, so they (or you) dont have to constantly petition for development lifecycles. Lowering fraud should not be a Sophies Choice between working cases or project managing engineering. It may seem overwhelming, but many of your peers are already building these types of programs. It is the best chance to stay ahead of bad actors, increased governmental scrutiny, and legislation. In less than a week, three former employees in Georgia, Ohio and New York were accused of allegedly stealing thousands of dollars from their credit unions following police investigations. On Nov. 1, Teresa Lynn Bruce, 50, of Flowery Branch, Ga. was accused of allegedly altering the books to steal $40,000 from the $35 million Lanier Federal Credit Union in Oakwood, Ga., reported the Gainesville Times. The newspaper, citing police sources, also reported Bruce was charged with forgery, ID theft and theft by taking. Robin Simpson, president/CEO of Lanier FCU, declined to comment because the incident remains under investigation by county prosecutors. In Ohio, Morgan Fuller, 21, a former teller for the $2.8 billion General Electric Credit Union in Cincinnati, was charged with allegedly embezzling nearly $34,000, Fox 19 TV news reported on Nov. 2. Trump announces his 2024 presidential run as GOP debates future Donald Trump announced he will run for the White House, even as weak midterm showings prompt debate about whether the GOP should move past him. Irrespective of the ideological currency one may hold, there is no denying that demonetisation was not launched just to get more people to punch in tax returns (not even actual tax payments) or push up digital transactions from abysmally low levels. Demonetisation was a colossal disruption and intended, indeed, towards bigger tangible results beyond the vague hunt for dormant (not shell) companies. Besides the chaos that it unleashed on the economy, the note ban turned out to be India's biggest policy mystery after 99 per cent of the high-denomination notes made their way back into banks. It has been a year since the government quietly unleashed a crackdown on dormant companies for their misadventures during the currency clamp. We can now assume that the revenue and banking mandarins are armed with adequate data to do away with the vital mysteries of demonetisation. On the first anniversary of demonetisation, the government owes answers to the following questions to India's ordinary citizens, who went through unprecedented pain and agony during and after the note ban: Question: Who were those "poor" who opened thousands of Jan Dhan accounts and deposited crores of rupees in old and new accounts during the note ban? A huge chunk of this money had reportedly been withdrawn subsequently. Reasoning: The operation and trajectory of Jan Dhan accounts is the biggest puzzle of the note ban. Post-demonetisation, 23.3 million new accounts were opened under PMJDY, the bulk of which (80 per cent) was with the public sector banks. Deposits under PMJDY accounts increased significantly post-demonetisation. According to a March 2017 RBI report, the total balance in PMJDY deposit accounts peaked at Rs 74,600 crore as on December 7, 2016 from Rs 45,600 crore as on November 9, 2016 - an increase of 63.6 per cent. As news reports kept floating about the misuse of these accounts to convert black money into white, the government capped deposits into PMJDY accounts at Rs 50,000 on November 15, 2016. Although deposits declined to Rs 64,300 crore by March 1, 2017, they were still higher by 41 per cent over the level of November 9, 2016. Gujarat had registered the highest (94 per cent) rise in Jan Dhan deposits during the demonetisation followed by Maharshtra, Rajasthan, Jharkhand, Haryana and UP - the finance ministers told Lok Sabha on February 3, 2017. Question: How much cash was transacted through the government (centre and state) treasuries, government/PSUs accounts in various banks during the days of demonetisation? Reasoning: Government treasuries and accounts had been kept free from the currency ban or cash transactions limits. Several government utilities had been specifically allowed to accept payments in demonetised currency during the note ban. Right in the middle of the demonetisation ordeal, the government had allowed political parties to deposit old Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes in their accounts. Photo: Reuters Also, the government treasuries received fresh notes, on priority, against their pile of old cash from the RBI during the currency rationing. Question: How many old notes reached banks via current accounts of businesses, including big corporates? Reasoning: As dormant companies have been found involved in currency laundering, it is reasonable to expect that the government will have adequate information about the use of active business cash accounts worthy of scrutiny during the note ban. Question: The nation deserves to know more about the transactions in the accounts of political parties and expenditure on political extravaganzas during the note ban. Reasoning: Right in the middle of the demonetisation ordeal, the government had allowed political parties to deposit old Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes in their accounts. They are already exempt from income tax, provided the donations taken are not more than Rs 20,000 per individual and sufficiently documented. However, after severe criticism, this facility, it was claimed, was withdrawn, but there is no harm in sharing available data in order to make politics credible. Last but not the least Question: After three weeks of the note ban, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had asked BJP legislators and parliamentarians to submit details of their bank transactions between November 8 and December 31 to party chief Amit Shah. Where are the details of those accounts? The more Prime Minister Narendra Modi claims to expose and target black money, the more it is found laundered to overseas tax havens by India's influential businessmen, wealthy traders, and unscrupulous tax lawyers. In the case of Panama Papers, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), with which The Indian Express was linked, published in February 2015 a list of 500 Indians who had routed sums to Panama, especially in the German-run bank Mossack Fonseca, which laundered hidden foreign wealth. In the first list of 100 Indians, the total accumulated wealth was estimated to be Rs 16,200 crore. Both Ambani brothers were listed as having more than $3 million each. However, the prime minister took no special interest in this matter. Slowly, interest in the investigation waned and the ICIJ information was swept under the rug. In other countries, for example, the prime minister of Iceland had to resign, fingers were pointed at Nawaz Sharif, the prime minister of Pakistan, and even a cellist supposedly known to president Vladimir Putin was allegedly involved in the Panama scandal. In India, the political elite pretended nothing much had happened. If we extrapolate from the Rs 16,200 crore linked to the first 100 names and multiply this sum by five, the 500 names' joint wealth would amount to Rs 86,000 crore, which would have been a useful contribution to the Indian exchequer. But the mammoth controversy was suppressed. Among the other politicians who appeared on the list are BJP MP and Union minister Jayant Sinha, and BJP Rajya Sabha MP RK Sinha whose name appears in the Malta list. Photo: PTI This week, The Indian Express reported another huge scam, but in Bermuda not Panama. India ranked 19th in the list of 180 countries whose investors parked huge funds in offshore tax havens. There are 714 Indians in the tally, some 214 more that the Panama Papers list. Sun Group, an Indian company founded by Nand Lal Khemka, figures in the Paradise Papers as the firm with the largest number of offshore entitites in the files of the 119-year-old law firm Appleby, which helps clients avoid and evade taxes, manage real estate assets, open escrow accounts, purchase airplanes and yachts by paying low tax rates; or simply use offshore vehicles to move millions of dollars across the globe. Some of Appleby's other Indian clients have come under the scrutiny of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and the Enforcement Directorate (ED) with cases such as Sun-TV-Aircel-Maxis, SNC-Lavalin and Ziquista Health Care (former Union minister Sachin Pilot and former Union minister P Chidambaram's son Karti were early honorary/independent directors of the firm). Among those with investments offshore is actor Amitabh Bachchan. However, his shareholding in a Bermuda company is legal because it was acquired prior to a 2004 scheme. Among the other politicians who appeared on the list are BJP MP and Union minister Jayant Sinha, and BJP Rajya Sabha MP RK Sinha whose name appears in the Malta list. In other words, there is a large trove of evidence that brings us to the moot point: will anything significant happen? The Panama Papers scam was not probed in spirit by the Modi government in 2015. ICIJ, in February 2015, published a list of 500 Indians who had routed sums to Panama, especially in the German-run bank Mossack Fonseca, which laundered hidden foreign wealth. Photo: Reuters The stakes are even higher now with the upcoming election campaign for the 2019 general election, and its outcome. Modi government will suppress, misinterpret and delay the investigation. Some in the Congress will also be nervous. But a country with India's maxim, Satyamev Jayate (the truth will triumph), must learn to overcome such limited embarrassments and cleanse the offshore havens where Indian money is misused for illegitimate profit instead of taxes to benefit the poor and needy. The political class will have to be firm with acting against tax evasions. Black money is indeed blackening. It is used for evading tax, spreading crime, buying votes and empowering those who violate the law. The incendiary call by Ashok Sharma, a leader of the Akhil Bharatiya Hindu Mahasabha (ABHM), following actor-turned-politician Kamal Haasans remarks on Hindu terror shows how extremist Hindu outfits have reduced themselves to the level of assorted Maulvis routinely issuing death threats to BJP and RSS leaders. This is what Sharma said: There is no other way to handle people like Kamal Haasan but to either hang them or shoot them dead. It is disappointing that senior leaders in the BJP have not condemned the Hindu Mahasabha and sought Sharmas prosecution. The Hindu Mahasabha is a prime example of how ideologically bankrupt extremist Hindu groups have become. Kamal Haasan has every right to express an opinion in this case on Hindu terror however provocative and wrong it may be. Debate him but do not hound him. By filing a complaint against him in a Varanasi court (which will hear the case on November 22), advocate Kamlesh Chandra Tripathi is playing right into the hands of those on the Left who try to conflate Hindu extremists with Islamist terrorism. To describe isolated acts of criminal violence or death threats by extremist Hindu groups as organised terror devalues the real fight against terrorism. In India, politicians have trodden a thin line over the issue of Hindu terror. The Congress-led UPA needs Muslim votes to stay in power. In the 2004 Lok Sabha election, it won just 145 seats and 26.53 per cent voteshare. The minority vote comprised a large chunk of this. Without Muslim votes, the Congress would have been reduced to less than 100 seats in 2004. In the 2009 Lok Sabha poll, the Congress won 206 seats with 28.55 per cent voteshare. Again, the Muslim vote proved crucial. This explains the Congress attempt during UPA-1 and UPA-2 to coin the term saffron terror. Rahul Gandhi, then a young MP, told a US envoy in 2005, according to a Wikileaks document which has not been disputed, that saffron terror was a larger threat to Indias national security than Islamic terror. Those words came to haunt him in the 2014 Lok Sabha election. The Congress faced a strong backlash from precisely the Hindu voters Rahul had demeaned by invoking the myth of saffron terror. The party plunged from 206 to 44 seats. Is saffron terror really a myth? Didnt the blasts at Malegaon, Mecca Masjid, Ajmer Dargah and on the Samjhauta Express prove that extremist Hindu groups like Abhinav Bharat were terrorists? The cases against Colonel Shrikant Purohit and Sadhvi Pragya have collapsed. The Samjhauta Express blast remains unsolved with LeT terrorist Arif Qasmani named by the US Department of Treasury as one of the culprits. Assuming though that extremist Hindu groups were responsible for these four acts of terror during 2007-08 and none thereafter it hardly points to organised saffron terrorism. Even one life taken by terror is unacceptable. Extremist Hindu groups, when found guilty of acts of terror, must be prosecuted, tried and if found guilty punished. But politicians seeking Muslim votes do Muslims themselves a disservice by conflating isolated incidents of Hindu terror with organised widespread Islamist terror perpetrated by ISIS, al-Qaeda, LeT, JeM, Hizbul Mujahideen and the Taliban. Such false narratives inculcate a sense of victimhood in ordinary Muslims. This makes them ever-more clannish, estranged from the mainstream, and vulnerable to radicalisation. Kamal Haasan speaks of Hindu terror as if it were the biggest threat facing India. It isnt. The term Hindu terror is oxymoronic. Hindus are by nature a passive (though not necessarily pacifist) people. If they were not, in a poor country beset with huge social and economic injustices, there would be violent civilian unrest of the kind we see in Catholic South America and the Islamic Middle East. If anything, Hindus have been silent victims. The incarceration of Colonel Purohit and Sadhvi Pragya for over six years without a charge sheet led to only muted protests from extremist Hindu terror groups and silence from the general Hindu majority population. For Kamal Haasan and his ilk to misuse the oxymoron Hindu terror reflects poorly on their judgment. The Roots Islamist terrorism is a deadly global scourge. Its most virulent manifestation laid deep institutional roots in 1979 when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. The United States, mired in a Cold War against the Soviets, saw in the invasion a repeat of the 19th-century great game when the Russian and British Empires contested the region on either side of the Khyber pass. The Afghans, then as now, were the hapless victims. Between 1979 and 1989, a US CIA-led operation trained and funded jihadis to fight the Soviets in Afghanistan. Pakistan was the hired gun. That planted the seed of modern Islamist terrorism. Two white Christian countries, the United States and the Soviet Union, thus helped create modern Islamist terror. Pakistan, the ever-willing servant of the West, seized the opportunity. In 1989 when the defeated Soviets withdrew, the US scaled down its jihadi operations in Afghanistan and left it to Pakistan to clean up the debris. Left to themselves, the Pakistani army and the ISI dispatched hardened, out-of-work jihadi fighters to the Kashmir Valley in 1989. The rest is history. Pakistan had used terrorists in the Khalistani insurgency. But the real target was Kashmir, the unfinished business of Partition. Benazir Bhutto, then Prime Minister, midwifed the Taliban in the early-1990s. Terror sank deep roots in Pakistan. Afghanistan was the ISIs laboratory of jihadism. Radicalisation of Kashmiri youth began even as the Valleys Pandits were brutally driven out of their homeland. Pakistan realised after its Kargil defeat that winning a conventional war with India was impossible. Terrorism presented a cheaper alternative. Young, impoverished boys from Pakistani villages were given elementary training in terror and sent across the border to kill Indian soldiers and civilians. It was low-cost, high impact. Families of Pakistani terrorists killed by Indian security forces were given money and land as compensation. The jihadi industry ticked along smoothly. Until the jihadis turned on their masters. Pakistan became both the biggest creator of terrorists and their biggest victim. S&P 500 3,991.73 DOW 33,592.92 QQQ 289.39 Retiring Soon? 8 Facts About Retirement You Need to Know New Banking App Revolution (Ad) Three Penny Stocks Making Big Moves In November Agilent Remains In Buy Range Ahead Of Next Week's Q4 Report New Banking App Revolution (Ad) Dont Chase Walmart Higher, Wait For Extra Low Prices Russian airstrikes reported in cities across Ukraine Don't miss out on this report (Ad) Stocks gain ground after wholesale inflation eases in US The Latest | UN Climate Summit S&P 500 3,991.73 DOW 33,592.92 QQQ 289.39 Retiring Soon? 8 Facts About Retirement You Need to Know New Banking App Revolution (Ad) Three Penny Stocks Making Big Moves In November Agilent Remains In Buy Range Ahead Of Next Week's Q4 Report New Banking App Revolution (Ad) Dont Chase Walmart Higher, Wait For Extra Low Prices Russian airstrikes reported in cities across Ukraine Don't miss out on this report (Ad) Stocks gain ground after wholesale inflation eases in US The Latest | UN Climate Summit S&P 500 3,991.73 DOW 33,592.92 QQQ 289.39 Retiring Soon? 8 Facts About Retirement You Need to Know New Banking App Revolution (Ad) Three Penny Stocks Making Big Moves In November Agilent Remains In Buy Range Ahead Of Next Week's Q4 Report New Banking App Revolution (Ad) Dont Chase Walmart Higher, Wait For Extra Low Prices Russian airstrikes reported in cities across Ukraine Don't miss out on this report (Ad) Stocks gain ground after wholesale inflation eases in US The Latest | UN Climate Summit S&P 500 3,991.73 DOW 33,592.92 QQQ 289.39 Retiring Soon? 8 Facts About Retirement You Need to Know On Watch: Israeli Tech Stock (Ad) Dont Chase Walmart Higher, Wait For Extra Low Prices Russian airstrikes reported in cities across Ukraine This Govt. Act Can Help Investors (Ad) Stocks gain ground after wholesale inflation eases in US The Latest | UN Climate Summit "TAKE THAT, CHINA!" USA Gains in EV Battery Arms Race (Ad) Walmart puts up strong Q3, announces opioid settlement G-20 to hold tough on Russia, urge end to Ukraine war S&P 500 3,991.73 DOW 33,592.92 QQQ 289.39 Retiring Soon? 8 Facts About Retirement You Need to Know On Watch: Israeli Tech Stock (Ad) Dont Chase Walmart Higher, Wait For Extra Low Prices Russian airstrikes reported in cities across Ukraine This Govt. Act Can Help Investors (Ad) Stocks gain ground after wholesale inflation eases in US The Latest | UN Climate Summit "TAKE THAT, CHINA!" USA Gains in EV Battery Arms Race (Ad) Walmart puts up strong Q3, announces opioid settlement G-20 to hold tough on Russia, urge end to Ukraine war S&P 500 3,991.73 DOW 33,592.92 QQQ 289.39 Retiring Soon? 8 Facts About Retirement You Need to Know On Watch: Israeli Tech Stock (Ad) Dont Chase Walmart Higher, Wait For Extra Low Prices Russian airstrikes reported in cities across Ukraine This Govt. Act Can Help Investors (Ad) Stocks gain ground after wholesale inflation eases in US The Latest | UN Climate Summit "TAKE THAT, CHINA!" USA Gains in EV Battery Arms Race (Ad) Walmart puts up strong Q3, announces opioid settlement G-20 to hold tough on Russia, urge end to Ukraine war Graco Inc. designs, manufactures, and markets systems and equipment used to move, measure, control, dispense, and spray fluid and powder materials worldwide. The company's Industrial segment offers proportioning systems to spray polyurethane foam and polyurea coatings; equipment that pumps, meters, mixes and dispenses sealant, adhesive, and composite materials; and gel-coat equipment, chop and wet-out systems, resin transfer molding systems and applicators, and precision dispensing solutions. It also provides liquid finishing equipment; paint circulating and supply pumps; paint circulating advanced control systems; plural component coating proportioners; spare parts and accessories; and powder finishing products to coat powder finishing on metals under the Gema and SAT brands. The company's Process segment offers pumps to move and dispense chemicals, water, wastewater, petroleum, food, lubricants, and other fluids; pressure valves used in the oil and natural gas industry, other industrial processes, and research facilities; and chemical injection pumping solutions for injection of chemicals into producing oil wells and pipelines. It also supplies pumps, hose reels, meters, valves, and accessories for fast oil change facilities, service garages, fleet service centers, automobile dealerships, auto parts stores, truck builders, and heavy equipment service centers; and systems, components, and accessories for the automatic lubrication of bearings, gears, and generators in industrial and commercial equipment, compressors, turbines, and on- and off-road vehicles. The company's Contractor segment offers sprayers to apply paint to walls and other structures; and viscous coatings to roofs, as well as markings on roads, parking lots, athletic fields, and floors. It sells its products through distributors, original equipment manufacturers, and home center channels; and directly to end-users. The company was incorporated in 1926 and is headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Kennametal Inc. engages in development and application of tungsten carbides, ceramics, and super-hard materials and solutions for use in metal cutting and extreme wear applications to enable customers work against corrosion and high temperatures conditions worldwide. The company operates through two segments, Metal Cutting and Infrastructure. It offers standard and custom products, including turning, milling, hole making, tooling systems, and services, as well as specialized wear components and metallurgical powders for manufacturers engaged in various industries, such as the manufacturers of transportation vehicles and components, machine tools, and light and heavy machinery; airframe and aerospace components; and energy-related components for the oil and gas industry, as well as power generation. The company also provides specified product design, selection, application, and support services; and standard and custom metal cutting solutions to aerospace, general engineering, energy, and transportation customers. In addition, it produces compacts, nozzles, frac seats, and custom components used in oil and gas, and petrochemical industries; rod blanks and abrasive water jet nozzles for general industries; earth cutting tools and systems used in underground mining, trenching and foundation drilling, and road milling; tungsten carbide powders for the oil and gas, aerospace, and process industries; and ceramics used by the packaging industry for metallization of films and papers. It provides its products under the Kennametal, WIDIA, WIDIA Hanita, and WIDIA GTD brands through its direct sales force; a network of independent and national distributors; integrated supplier channels; and through the Internet. The company was founded in 1938 and is based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. BT Group plc provides communications services worldwide. Its Consumer segment sells telephones, baby monitors, and Wi-Fi extenders through high street retailers, online BT Shop, and Website BT.com; and offers home phone, copper and fiber broadband, TV, and mobile services in various packages. The company's EE segment offers 2G, 3G, and 4G mobile network services; broadband, fixed-voice, and TV services; and postpaid and prepaid plans, and emergency services network. This segment also sells 4G mobile phones, tablets, connected devices, and mobile broadband devices from various manufacturers. Its Business and Public Sector segment provides fixed voice, mobility, fiber and connectivity, and networked IT services to retailers, utilities, public sector, healthcare, sports, construction, finance, and educational sectors. The company's Global Services segment offers business communications and ICT services comprising BT Connect, BT Security, BT One, BT Contact, BT Compute, BT Advise, and BT for financial markets. This segment serves approximately 5,500 customers in 180 countries. Its Wholesale and Ventures segment enables communications providers and other organizations to provide fixed or mobile phone services. Its ventures provide mass-market services, such as directory enquiries and payphones; and enterprise services comprising BT Fleet and BT Redcare. This segment also provides broadband and Ethernet, voice, hosted communication, mobile virtual network operator, managed solutions, machine-to-machine, roaming, and media services. The company's Openreach segment engages in the provision of services over the local access network; and installation and maintenance of fiber and copper communications networks that connect homes and businesses. The company was formerly known as Newgate Telecommunications Limited and changed its name to BT Group plc in September 2001. BT Group plc was incorporated in 2001 and is headquartered in London, the United Kingdom. S&P 500 3,991.73 DOW 33,592.92 QQQ 289.39 Retiring Soon? 8 Facts About Retirement You Need to Know New Banking App Revolution (Ad) Dont Chase Walmart Higher, Wait For Extra Low Prices Russian airstrikes reported in cities across Ukraine Apple, Amazon, and Walmart are Investing in Solar Energy (Ad) Stocks gain ground after wholesale inflation eases in US The Latest | UN Climate Summit Apple, Amazon, and Walmart are Investing in Solar Energy (Ad) Walmart puts up strong Q3, announces opioid settlement G-20 to hold tough on Russia, urge end to Ukraine war S&P 500 3,991.73 DOW 33,592.92 QQQ 289.39 Retiring Soon? 8 Facts About Retirement You Need to Know New Banking App Revolution (Ad) Dont Chase Walmart Higher, Wait For Extra Low Prices Russian airstrikes reported in cities across Ukraine Apple, Amazon, and Walmart are Investing in Solar Energy (Ad) Stocks gain ground after wholesale inflation eases in US The Latest | UN Climate Summit Apple, Amazon, and Walmart are Investing in Solar Energy (Ad) Walmart puts up strong Q3, announces opioid settlement G-20 to hold tough on Russia, urge end to Ukraine war S&P 500 3,991.73 DOW 33,592.92 QQQ 289.39 Retiring Soon? 8 Facts About Retirement You Need to Know New Banking App Revolution (Ad) Dont Chase Walmart Higher, Wait For Extra Low Prices Russian airstrikes reported in cities across Ukraine Apple, Amazon, and Walmart are Investing in Solar Energy (Ad) Stocks gain ground after wholesale inflation eases in US The Latest | UN Climate Summit Apple, Amazon, and Walmart are Investing in Solar Energy (Ad) Walmart puts up strong Q3, announces opioid settlement G-20 to hold tough on Russia, urge end to Ukraine war The following companies are subsidiares of Molina Healthcare: Aetna & Humana - Medicare Advantage, Affinity Health Plan, AmericanWork Inc., Better Health Network, Camelot Care Centers Inc, Children's Behavioral Health Inc., Choices Group Inc., College Community Services, Dockside Services Inc, Family Preservation Services Inc., Family Preservation Services of Florida Inc., Family Preservation Services of North Carolina Inc., Family Preservation Services of Washington D.C. Inc., Family Preservation Services of West Virginia Inc., Florida NetPASS LLC, Hclb Inc., Magellan Complete Care, Maple Star Nevada Inc., Maple Star Oregon Inc., Mercy CarePlus, Molina Clinical Services LLC, Molina Healthcare Data Center Inc., Molina Healthcare of Arizona Inc., Molina Healthcare of California, Molina Healthcare of Florida Inc., Molina Healthcare of Georgia Inc., Molina Healthcare of Illinois Inc., Molina Healthcare of Iowa Inc., Molina Healthcare of Louisiana Inc., Molina Healthcare of Maryland Inc., Molina Healthcare of Michigan Inc., Molina Healthcare of Mississippi Inc., Molina Healthcare of Nevada Inc., Molina Healthcare of New Mexico Inc., Molina Healthcare of New York Inc., Molina Healthcare of North Carolina Inc., Molina Healthcare of Ohio Inc., Molina Healthcare of Oklahoma Inc., Molina Healthcare of Pennsylvania Inc., Molina Healthcare of Puerto Rico Inc., Molina Healthcare of South Carolina LLC, Molina Healthcare of Texas Inc., Molina Healthcare of Texas Insurance Company, Molina Healthcare of Utah Inc., Molina Healthcare of Virginia Inc., Molina Healthcare of Washington Inc., Molina Healthcare of Wisconsin Inc., Molina Holdings Corporation, Molina Hospital Management LLC, Molina Information Systems LLC dba Molina Medicaid Solutions, Molina Medical Management Inc., Molina Pathways LLC, Molina Pathways of Texas Inc., Molina Youth Academy, NextLevel Health Illinois, Pathways Community Corrections Inc., Pathways Community Services LLC, Pathways Community Support of Texas Inc., Pathways Health and Community Support LLC, Pathways Human Services LLC., Pathways of Arizona Inc., Pathways of Delaware Inc., Pathways of Idaho LLC, Pathways of Maine Inc., Pathways of Massachusetts LLC, Pathways of Oklahoma Inc., Pathways of Washington Inc., Providence Community Services, Providence Human Services, Raystown Developmental Services Inc., The Game of Work LLC, The RedCo Group Inc., Total Care Medicaid plan, Transitional Family Services Inc., Unisys -Health Information Management, and YourCare Health Plan. Read More Principal Financial Group, Inc. provides retirement, asset management, and insurance products and services to businesses, individuals, and institutional clients worldwide. The company operates through Retirement and Income Solutions, Principal Global Investors, Principal International, and U.S. Insurance Solutions segments. The Retirement and Income Solutions segment provides a portfolio of asset accumulation products and services for retirement savings and income. It offers products and services for defined contribution plans, including 401(k) and 403(b) plans, defined benefit pension plans, nonqualified executive benefit plans, employee stock ownership plans, equity compensation, and pension risk transfer services; individual retirement accounts; investment only products; and mutual funds, individual variable annuities, and bank products. The Principal Global Investors segment provides equity, fixed income, real estate, and other alternative investments, as well as asset allocation, stable value management, and other structured investment strategies. The Principal International segment offers pension accumulation products and services, mutual funds, asset management, income annuities, and life insurance accumulation products, as well as voluntary savings plans in Brazil, Chile, Mexico, China, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, India, and Southeast Asia. The U.S. Insurance Solutions segment provides specialty benefits, such as group dental and vision insurance, group life insurance, and group and individual disability insurance, as well as administers group dental, disability, and vision benefits; and individual life insurance products comprising universal, variable universal, indexed universal, and term life insurance products in the United States. It also offers insurance solutions for small and medium-sized businesses and their owners, as well as executives. Principal Financial Group, Inc. was founded in 1879 and is based in Des Moines, Iowa. 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 MetLife: 10700 WILSHIRE LLC, 1201 TAB MANAGER LLC, 1350 EYE STREET MANAGER LLC, 1350 EYE STREET OWNER LLC, 150 NORTH RIVERSIDE PE MEMBER LLC, 1925 WJC OWNER LLC, 23RD STREET INVESTMENTS INC., 500 GRANT STREET ASSOCIATES LIMITED PARTNERSHIP, 500 GRANT STREET GP LLC, 6104 HOLLYWOOD LLC, AFP GENESIS ADMINISTRADORA DE FONDOS Y FIDECOMISOS S.A., AGENVITA S.R.L., ALICO HELLAS SINGLE MEMBER LIMITED LIABILITY COMPANY, ALICO OPERATIONS LLC, American Life Insurance Company, BEST MARKET S.A., BLOCK VISION HOLDINGS CORPORATION, BLOCK VISION OF TEXAS INC., BORDERLAND INVESTMENTS LIMITED, BOULEVARD RESIDENTIAL LLC, BUFORD LOGISTICS CENTER LLC, CC HOLDCO MANAGER LLC, CHESTNUT FLATS WIND LLC, CLOSED JOINT-STOCK COMPANY MASTER-D, COMPANIA INVERSORA METLIFE S.A., CORPORATE REAL ESTATE HOLDINGS LLC, COVA LIFE MANAGEMENT COMPANY, DAVIS VISION INC., DAVISVISION IPA INC., DELAWARE AMERICAN LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY, EURO CL INVESTMENTS LLC, EXCELENCIA OPERATIVA Y TECNOLOGICA S.A de C.V., FORTISSIMO CO. LTD, FUNDACION METLIFE MEXICO A.C., GLOBAL PROPERTIES INC., General American Life Insurance Company, Grand Bank N.A., HASKELL EAST VILLAGE LLC, HOUSING FUND MANAGER LLC, INTERNATIONAL TECHNICAL AND ADVISORY SERVICES LIMITED, INVERSIONES METLIFE HOLDCO DOS LIMITADA, INVERSIONES METLIFE HOLDCO TRES LIMITADA, LHC HOLDINGS LLC, LHCW HOLDINGS LLC, LHCW HOTEL HOLDING 2002 LLC, LHCW HOTEL HOLDING LLC, LHCW HOTEL OPERATING COMPANY 2002 LLC, LUMENLAB MALAYSIA SDN. BHD., Logan Circle Partners, MARKETPLACE RESIDENCES LLC, MC PORTFOLIO JV MEMBER LLC, MCJV LLC, MCPP OWNERS LLC, MCRE BLOCK 40 LP, MEC HEALTH CARE INC., MET 1065 HOTEL LLC, MET CANADA SOLAR ULC, METLIFE 1007 STEWART LLC, METLIFE 1201 TAB MEMBER LLC, METLIFE 425 MKT MANAGER LLC, METLIFE 425 MKT MEMBER LLC, METLIFE 555 12TH MEMBER LLC, METLIFE 8280 MEMBER LLC, METLIFE ACOMA OWNER LLC, METLIFE ADMINISTRADORA DE FUNDOS MULTIPATROCINADOS LTDA., METLIFE ALTERNATIVES GP LLC, METLIFE ASHTON AUSTIN OWNER LLC, METLIFE ASIA HOLDING COMPANY PTE. LTD., METLIFE ASIA LIMITED, METLIFE ASIA SERVICES SDN. BHD, METLIFE ASSET MANAGEMENT CORP., METLIFE ASSIGNMENT COMPANY INC., METLIFE BORO STATION MEMBER LLC, METLIFE CAMINO RAMON MEMBER LLC, METLIFE CAMPUS AT SGV MEMBER LLC, METLIFE CAPITAL CREDIT L.P., METLIFE CAPITAL LIMITED PARTNERSHIP, METLIFE CAPITAL TRUST IV, METLIFE CB W/A LLC, METLIFE CC MEMBER LLC, METLIFE CHILE ADMINISTRADORA DE MUTUOS HIPOTECARIOS S.A., METLIFE CHILE INVERSIONES LIMITADA, METLIFE CHILE SEGUROS DE VIDA S.A., METLIFE CHILE SEGUROS GENERALES S.A., METLIFE CHINO MEMBER LLC, METLIFE COLOMBIA SEGUROS de VIDA S.A., METLIFE COMMERCIAL MORTGAGE INCOME FUND GP LLC, METLIFE CONSQUARE MEMBER LLC, METLIFE CONSUMER SERVICES INC., METLIFE CORE PROPERTY FUND GP LLC, METLIFE CREDIT CORP., METLIFE DIGITAL VENTURES INC., METLIFE ENHANCED CORE PROPERTY FUND GP LLC, METLIFE EU HOLDING COMPANY LIMITED, METLIFE EUROPE INSURANCE d.a.c., METLIFE EUROPE SERVICES LIMITED, METLIFE EUROPE d.a.c., METLIFE EUROPEAN HOLDINGS LLC., METLIFE FINANCIAL SERVICES CO. LTD, METLIFE FM HOTEL MEMBER LLC, METLIFE FUNDING INC., METLIFE GENERAL INSURANCE LIMITED, METLIFE GLOBAL BENEFITS LTD., METLIFE GLOBAL HOLDING COMPANY I GMBH, METLIFE GLOBAL HOLDING COMPANY II GMBH, METLIFE GLOBAL HOLDINGS CORPORATION S.A. De C.V., METLIFE GLOBAL INC., METLIFE GLOBAL OPERATIONS SUPPORT CENTER PRIVATE LIMITED, METLIFE GROUP INC., METLIFE HCMJV 1 GP LLC, METLIFE HCMJV 1 LP LLC, METLIFE HEALTH PLANS INC., METLIFE HOLDINGS INC., METLIFE HOME LOANS LLC, METLIFE INNOVATION CENTRE LIMITED, METLIFE INNOVATION CENTRE PTE. LTD., METLIFE INSURANCE AND INVESTMENT TRUST, METLIFE INSURANCE BROKERAGE INC., METLIFE INSURANCE COMPANY OF KOREA LTD., METLIFE INSURANCE K.K., METLIFE INSURANCE LIMITED, METLIFE INTERNATIONAL HF PARTNERS LP, METLIFE INTERNATIONAL HOLDINGS LLC, METLIFE INTERNATIONAL LIMITED LLC, METLIFE INTERNATIONAL PE FUND I LP, METLIFE INTERNATIONAL PE FUND II LP, METLIFE INTERNATIONAL PE FUND III LP, METLIFE INTERNATIONAL PE FUND IV LP, METLIFE INTERNATIONAL PE FUND V LP, METLIFE INTERNATIONAL PE FUND VI LP, METLIFE INTERNATIONAL PE FUND VII LP, METLIFE INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT EUROPE LIMITED, METLIFE INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT HOLDINGS LIMITED, METLIFE INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT HOLDINGS LLC, METLIFE INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT LIMITED, METLIFE INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT LLC, METLIFE INVESTMENTS ASIA LIMITED, METLIFE INVESTMENTS LIMITED, METLIFE INVESTMENTS PTY LIMITED, METLIFE INVESTMENTS SECURITIES LLC, METLIFE INVESTORS DISTRIBUTION COMPANY, METLIFE INVESTORS GROUP LLC, METLIFE IRELAND TREASURY D.A.C., METLIFE JAPAN US EQUITY FUND GP LLC, METLIFE JAPAN US EQUITY FUND LP, METLIFE JAPAN US EQUITY OWNERS BLOCKER LLC, METLIFE JAPAN US EQUITY OWNERS LLC, METLIFE LATIN AMERICA ASESORIAS E INVERSIONES LIMITADA, METLIFE LEGAL PLANS INC., METLIFE LEGAL PLANS OF FLORIDA INC., METLIFE LHH MEMBER LLC, METLIFE LIFE INSURANCE S.A., METLIFE LOAN ASSET MANAGEMENT LLC, METLIFE LONG SHORT CREDIT FUND LP, METLIFE LONG SHORT CREDIT MASTER FUND LP, METLIFE LONG SHORT CREDIT PARALLEL FUND LP, METLIFE MAS S.A. DE C.V., METLIFE MEXICO HOLDINGS S. DE R.L. DE C.V., METLIFE MEXICO S.A. DE C.V., METLIFE MEXICO SERVICIOS S.A. DE C.V., METLIFE MIDDLE MARKET PRIVATE DEBT FUND II LP, METLIFE MIDDLE MARKET PRIVATE DEBT GP II LLC, METLIFE MIDDLE MARKET PRIVATE DEBT GP LLC, METLIFE MIDDLE MARKET PRIVATE DEBT II RATED FUND LP, METLIFE MIDDLE MARKET PRIVATE DEBT PARALLEL FUND LP, METLIFE MIDDLE MARKET PRIVATE DEBT PARALLEL GP LLC, METLIFE MMPD II SPECIAL LLC, METLIFE MULTI-FAMILY PARTNERS III LLC, METLIFE OBS MEMBER LLC, METLIFE OFC MEMBER LLC, METLIFE ONTARIO STREET MEMBR LLC, METLIFE PARK TOWER MEMBER LLC, METLIFE PENSION TRUSTEES LIMITED, METLIFE PENSIONES MEXICO S.A., METLIFE PET INSURANCE SOLUTIONS LLC, METLIFE PLANOS ODONTOLOGICOS LTDA., METLIFE POWSZECHNE TOWARTZYSTWO EMERYTALNE S.A., METLIFE PRIVATE EQUITY HOLDINGS LLC, METLIFE PROPERTIES VENTURES LLC, METLIFE RC SF MEMBER LLC, METLIFE REAL ESTATE LENDING LLC, METLIFE REINSURANCE COMPANY OF BERMUDA LTD., METLIFE REINSURANCE COMPANY OF CHARLESTON, METLIFE REINSURANCE COMPANY OF VERMONT, METLIFE RETIREMENT SERVICES LLC, METLIFE SECURITIZATION DEPOSITOR LLC, METLIFE SEGUROS S.A., METLIFE SENIOR DIRECT LENDING FINCO LLC, METLIFE SENIOR DIRECT LENDING FUND LP, METLIFE SENIOR DIRECT LENDING GP LLC, METLIFE SENIOR DIRECT LENDING HOLDINGS LP, METLIFE SERVICES AND SOLUTIONS LLC, METLIFE SERVICES CYPRUS LTD., METLIFE SERVICES EAST PRIVATE LIMITED, METLIFE SERVICES EEIG, METLIFE SERVICES EOOD, METLIFE SERVICES SOCIEDAD LIMITADA, METLIFE SERVICES SP Z.O.O, METLIFE SERVICIOS S.A., METLIFE SINGLE FAMILY RENTAL FUND GP LLC, METLIFE SINGLE FAMILY RENTAL FUND LP, METLIFE SOLUTIONS PTE. LTD., METLIFE SOLUTIONS S.A.S., METLIFE SP HOLDINGS LLC, METLIFE STRATEGIC HOTEL DEBT FUND GP LLC, METLIFE SYNDICATED BANK LOAN LUX GP S.A.R.L., METLIFE THR INVESTOR LLC, METLIFE TOWARZYSTWO FUNDUSZY INWESTYCYJNYCH S.A., METLIFE TOWARZYSTWO UBEZPIECZEN NA ZYCIE I REASEKURACJI S.A., METLIFE TOWER RESOURCES GROUP INC., METLIFE TREAT TOWERS MEMBER LLC, METLIFE WORLDWIDE HOLDINGS LLC, METROPOLITAN GENERAL INSURANCE COMPANY, METROPOLITAN GLOBAL MANAGEMENT LLC, METROPOLITAN LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY, METROPOLITAN LIFE SEGUROS E PREVIDENCIA PRIVADA S.A., METROPOLITAN LIFE SOCIETATE de ADMINISTRARE a UNUI FOND de PENSII ADMINISTRAT PRIVAT S.A., METROPOLITAN TOWER LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY, METROPOLITAN TOWER REALTY COMPANY INC., MEX DF PROPERTIES LLC, MFA FINANCING VEHICLE CTR1 LLC, MIDTOWN HEIGHTS LLC, MIM CAMPUS AT SGV MANAGER LLC, MIM CLAL GENERAL PARTNER LLC, MIM CM SYNDICATOR LLC, MIM EMD GP LLC, MIM I LLC, MIM LS GP LLC, MIM METWEST INTERNATIONAL MANAGER LLC, MIM ML-AI VENTURE 5 MANAGER LLC, MIM OMD MANAGER LLC, MIM PROPERTY MANAGEMENT LLC, MIM PROPERTY MANAGEMENT OF GEORGIA 1 LLC, MIM SPOKANE INDUSTRIAL MANAGER LLC, MIM THIRD ARMY INDUSTRIAL MANAGER LLC, MISSOURI REINSURANCE INC., ML 300 THIRD MEMBER LLC, ML ARMATURE MEMBER LLC, ML BELLEVUE MANAGER LLC, ML BELLEVUE MEMBER LLC, ML CAPACITACION COMERCIAL S.A. DE C.V., ML CERRITOS TC MEMBER LLC, ML CLAL MEMBER LLC, ML CORNER 63 MEMBER LLC, ML DOLPHIN GP LLC, ML DOLPHIN MEZZ LLC, ML HUDSON MEMBER LLC, ML MATSON MILLS MEMBER LLC, ML MILILANI MEMBER LLC, ML OMD MEMBER LLC, ML ONE BEDMINSTER LLC, ML PORT CHESTER SC MEMBER LLC, ML SENTINEL SQUARE MEMBER LLC, ML SLOANS LAKE MEMEBR LLC, ML SOUTHLANDS MEMBER LLC, ML SOUTHMORE LLC, ML SPOKANE INDUSTRIAL MEMBER LLC, ML SWAN GP LLC, ML SWAN MEZZ LLC, ML TERRACES LLC, ML THIRD ARMY INDUSTRIAL MEMBER LLC, ML VENTURE 1 MANAGER S. DE R. L. DE C.V., ML VENTURE 1 SERVICER LLC, ML-AI METLIFE MEMBER 1 LLC, ML-AI METLIFE MEMBER 2 LLC, ML-AI METLIFE MEMBER 3 LLC, ML-AI METLIFE MEMBER 4 LLC, ML-AI METLIFE MEMBER 5 LLC, ML-URS PORT CHESTER SC MANAGER LLC, MLIA MANAGER I LLC, MLIA PARK TOWER MANAGER LLC, MLIA SBAF COLONY MANAGER LLC, MLIA SBAF MANAGER LLC, MLIC ASSET HOLDINGS II LLC, MLIC ASSET HOLDINGS LLC, MLIC CB HOLDINGS LLC, MLJ US FEEDER LLC, MM GLOBAL OPERATIONS SUPPORT CENTER S.A. DE C.V., MMP CEDAR STREET OWNER LLC, MMP CEDAR STREET REIT LLC, MMP HOLDINGS III LLC, MMP OLIVIAN OWNER LLC, MMP OLIVIAN REIT LLC, MMP OWNERS III LLC, MMP OWNERS LLC, MMP SOUTH PARK OWNER LLC, MMP SOUTH PARK REIT LLC, MNQM TRUST 2020, MREF 425 MKT LLC, MSHDF HOLDCO I LLC, MSV IRVINE PROPERTY LLC, MTL LEASING LLC, MTU HOTEL OWNER LLC, NATILOPORTEM HOLDINGS LLC, NEWBURY INSURANCE COMPANY LIMITED, OCONEE GOLF COMPANY LLC, OCONEE HOTEL COMPANY LLC, OCONEE LAND COMPANY LLC, OCONEE LAND DEVELOPMENT COMPANY LLC, OCONEE MARINA COMPANY LLC, OMI MLIC INVESTMENTS LIMITED, PACIFIC LOGISTICS INDUSTRIAL NORTH LLC, PACIFIC LOGISTICS INDUSTRIAL SOUTH LLC, PARK TOWER JV MEMBER LLC, PARK TOWER REIT INC., PJSC METLIFE, PLAZA DRIVE PROPERTIES LLC, PREFCO FOURTEEN LLC, PREFCO XIV HOLDINGS LLC, PROVIDA INTERNACIONAL S.A., SAFEGUARD HEALTH ENTERPRISES INC., SAFEGUARD HEALTH PLANS INC., SAFEHEALTH LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY, SOUTHCREEK INDUSTRIAL HOLDINGS LLC, ST. JAMES FLEET INVESTMENTS TWO LIMITED, SUPERIOR PROCUREMENT INC., SUPERIOR VISION BENEFIT MANAGEMENT INC., SUPERIOR VISION HOLDINGS INC., SUPERIOR VISION INSURANCE INC., SUPERIOR VISION INSURANCE PLAN OF WISCONSIN INC., SUPERIOR VISION OF NEW JERSEY INC., SUPERIOR VISION SERVICES INC., Safeguard Health Enterprises, Security First Group Inc., THE BUILDING AT 575 FIFTH AVENUE MEZZANINE LLC, THE BUILDING AT 575 FIFTH RETAIL HOLDING LLC, THE BUILDING AT 575 FIFTH RETAIL OWNER, THE DIRECT CALL CENTRE PTY LIMITED, TRANSMOUNTAIN LAND & LIVESTOCK COMPANY, UVC INDEPENDENT PRACTICE ASSOCIATION INC., VERSANT HEALTH CONSOLIDATIONS CORP., VERSANT HEALTH HOLDCO INC., VERSANT HEALTH INC., VERSANT HEALTH LAB LLC, VIRIDIAN MIRACLE MILE LLC, VISION 21 MANAGED EYE CARE OF TAMPA BAY INC., VISION 21 PHYSICIAN PRACTICE MANAGEMENT COMPANY, VISION TWENTY-ONE MANAGED EYE CARE IPA INC., Versant Health, WDV ACQUISITION CORP., WFP 1000 HOLDING COMPANY GP LLC, WHITE OAK ROYALTY COMPANY, WHITE TRACT II LLC, and Willing. Read More Koppers Holdings Inc. provides treated wood products, wood preservation chemicals, and carbon compounds in the United States, Australasia, Europe, and internationally. The company operates through three segments: Railroad and Utility Products and Services (RUPS), Performance Chemicals (PC), and Carbon Materials and Chemicals (CMC). The RUPS segment procures and treats crossties, switch ties, and various types of lumber used for railroad bridges and crossings. It also provides rail joint bars to join rails together for railroads; transmission and distribution poles for electric and telephone utilities; and pilings. This segment also provides railroad services, such as engineering, design, repair, and inspection services for railroad bridges. The PC segment develops, manufactures, and markets copper-based wood preservatives, including micronized copper azole, micronized pigments, alkaline copper quaternary, amine copper azole, and chromated copper arsenate for decking, fencing, utility poles, construction lumber and timbers, and various agricultural uses; and supplies fire-retardant chemicals for pressure treatment of wood primarily in commercial construction. The CMC segment manufactures creosote for the treatment of wood or as a feedstock in the production of carbon black; carbon pitch, a raw material used in the production of aluminum and steel; naphthalene for use as a feedstock in the production of phthalic anhydride and as a surfactant in the production of concrete; phthalic anhydride for the production of plasticizers, polyester resins, and alkyd paints; and carbon black feedstock for use in the production of carbon black. The company serves the railroad, specialty chemical, utility, residential lumber, agriculture, aluminum, steel, rubber, and construction industries. Koppers Holdings Inc. was founded in 1988 and is headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Helix Energy Solutions Group, Inc., an offshore energy services company, provides specialty services to the offshore energy industry primarily in Brazil, the Gulf of Mexico, North Sea, the Asia Pacific, and West Africa regions. The company operates through three segments: Well Intervention, Robotics, and Production Facilities. It engages in the installation of flowlines, control umbilicals, and manifold assemblies and risers; trenching and burial of pipelines; installation and tie-in of riser and manifold assembly; commissioning, testing, and inspection activities; and provision of cable and umbilical lay, and connection services. The company also provides well intervention, intervention engineering, and production enhancement services; inspection, repair, and maintenance of production structures, trees, jumpers, risers, pipelines, and subsea equipment; and related support services. In addition, it offers reclamation and remediation services; well plug and abandonment services; pipeline abandonment services; and site inspections. Additionally, the company offers oil and natural gas processing facilities and services; and fast response system, as well as site clearance and subsea support services. It serves independent oil and gas producers and suppliers, pipeline transmission companies, renewable energy companies, and offshore engineering and construction firms. The company was formerly known as Cal Dive International, Inc. and changed its name to Helix Energy Solutions Group, Inc. in March 2006. Helix Energy Solutions Group, Inc. was incorporated in 1979 and is headquartered in Houston, Texas. The following companies are subsidiares of PepsiCo: Alimentos Quaker Oats y Compania Limitada, Alimentos del Istmo S.A., Amavale Agricola Ltda., Anderson Hill Insurance Limited, Asia Bottlers Limited, BAESA Capital Corporation Ltd., BFY Brands, BFY Brands LLC, BFY Brands Limited, BUG de Mexico S.A. de C.V., Balmoral Industries LLC, Bare Foods Co., Barrhead LLC, Be & Cheery, Beaman Bottling Company, Bebidas Sudamerica S.A., Beech Limited, Bell Taco Funding Syndicate, Bendler Investments II Ltd, Bendler Investments S.a r.l, Beverage Services Limited, Beverages Foods & Service Industries Inc., Bishkeksut OJSC, Blaue NC S. de R.L. de C.V., Blue Cloud Distribution Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Arizona Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Arkansas Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Colorado Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Florida Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Georgia Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Illinois Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Indiana Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Iowa Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Kentucky Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Louisiana Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Minnesota Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Mississippi Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Missouri Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Nebraska Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Nevada Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of North Carolina Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Ohio Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Oklahoma Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Pennsylvania Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of South Carolina Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Tennessee Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Texas Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Virginia Inc., Blue Cloud Distribution of Wisconsin Inc., Blue Ridge Sales LLC, Bluebird Foods Limited, Bluecan Holdings Unlimited Company, Bokomo Zambia Limited, Bolsherechensky Molkombinat JSC, Boquitas Fiestas LLC, Boquitas Fiestas S.R.L., Bottling Group Financing LLC, Bottling Group Holdings LLC, Bottling Group LLC, Bronte Industries Ltd, C & I Leasing Inc., CB Manufacturing Company Inc., CEME Holdings LLC, CMC Investment Company, Caroni Investments LLC, Centro-Mediterranea de Bebidas Carbonicas PepsiCo S.L., Ceres Fruit Juices Pty Ltd, ChampBev Inc., China Concentrate Holdings Hong Kong Limited, Chipsy International for Food Industries S.A.E., Chipsy for Food Industries S.A.E., Chitos Internacional y Cia Ltda, Cipa Industrial de Produtos Alimentares Ltda., Cipa Nordeste Industrial de Produtos Alimentares Ltda., Cocina Autentica Inc., Comercializadora CMC Investment y Compania Limitada, Comercializadora Nacional SAS Ltda., Comercializadora PepsiCo Mexico S de R.L. de C.V., Compania de Bebidas PepsiCo S.L., Concentrate Holding Uruguay Pte. Ltd., Concentrate Manufacturing Singapore Pte. Ltd., Confiteria Alegro S. de R.L. de C.V., Copella Fruit Juices Limited, Copper Beech International LLC, Corina Snacks Limited, Corporativo Internacional Mexicano S. de R.L. de C.V., CytoSport Holdings Inc., CytoSport Inc., Davlyn Realty Corporation, Defosto Holdings Limited, Desarrollo Inmobiliario Gamesa S. de R.L. de C.V., Dilexis S.A., Donon Holdings Limited, Drinkfinity USA Inc., Drinkstation Inc., Drinkstation Innovation Co. Ltd., Drinkstation Limited, Dutch Snacks Holding S.A. de C.V., Duyvis Production B.V., EPIC Enterprises Inc., Echo Bay Holdings Inc., Elaboradora Argentina de Cereales S.R.L., Enter Logistica LLC, Environ at Inverrary Partnership, Environ of Inverrary Inc., Eridanus Investments S.a r.l, Evercrisp Snack Productos de Chile S.A., FL Transportation Inc., FLI Andean LLC, FLI Colombia LLC, FLI Snacks Andean GP LLC, Fabrica PepsiCo Mexicali S. de R.L. de C.V., Fabrica de Productos Alimenticios Rene y Cia S.C.A., Fairlight International SRL, Far East Bottlers Hong Kong Limited, Food Concepts Pioneer Ltd., Forest Akers Nederland B.V., Forty-Six Peaks Holding Inc., Fovarosi Asvanyviz es Uditoipari Zartkoruen Mukodo Reszvenytarsasag, Freshwater International B.V., Frito Lay Gida Sanayi Ve Ticaret Anonim Sirketi, Frito Lay Poland Sp. z o.o., Frito Lay Sp. z o.o., Frito Lay de Guatemala y Compania Limitada, Frito-Lay Australia Holdings Pty Limited, Frito-Lay Dip Company Inc., Frito-Lay Dominicana S.A., Frito-Lay Global Investments B.V., Frito-Lay Inc., Frito-Lay Investments B.V., Frito-Lay Manufacturing LLC, Frito-Lay Netherlands Holding B.V., Frito-Lay North America Inc., Frito-Lay Sales Inc., Frito-Lay Trading Company Europe GmbH, Frito-Lay Trading Company GmbH, Frito-Lay Trading Company Poland GmbH, Frito-Lay Trinidad Unlimited, Fruko Mesrubat Sanayi Limited Sirketi, GB Czech LLC, GB International Inc., GB Russia LLC, GB Slovak LLC, GMP Manufacturing Inc., Gambrinus Investments Limited, Gamesa LLC, Gamesa S. de R.L. de C.V., Gas Natural de Merida S. A. de C. V., Gatorade Puerto Rico Company, General Bottlers of Hungary Inc., Golden Grain Company, Goveh S.R.L., Grayhawk Leasing LLC, Green Hemlock International LLC, Grupo Frito Lay y Compania Limitada, Grupo Gamesa S. de R.L. de C.V., Grupo Mabel, Grupo Sabritas S. de R.L. de C.V., Gulkevichskiy Maslozavod JSC, Hangzhou Baicaowei Corporate Management Consulting Co. Ltd., Hangzhou Haomusi Food Co, Hangzhou Haomusi Food Co. Ltd., Hangzhou Tao Dao Technology Co. Ltd., Health Warrior, Health Warrior Inc., Heathland LP, Helioscope Limited, Hillbrook Inc., Hillgrove Inc., Hillwood Bottling LLC, Hogganfield Limited Partnership, Holding Company "Opolie" JSC, Homefinding Company of Texas, Hudson Valley Insurance Company, IC Equities Inc., IZZE Beverage Co., Inmobiliaria Interamericana S.A. De C.V., Integrated Beverage Services Bangladesh Limited, Integrated Foods & Beverages Pvt. Ltd., International Bottlers Management Co. LLC, International KAS Aktiengesellschaft, Inversiones Borneo S.R.L., Inversiones PFI Chile Limitada, Inviting Foods Holdings Inc., Inviting Foods LLC, KAS Anorthosis S.a r.l, KAS S.L., KFC, Kevita Inc., Kinvara LLC, Kungursky Molkombinat JSC, Larragana S.L., Latin American Holdings Ltd., Latin American Snack Foods ApS, Latin Foods International LLC, Lebedyansky, Lebedyansky Holdings LLC, Lebedyansky LLC, Limited Liability Company "Sandora", Linkbay Limited, Lithuanian Snacks UAB, Mabel, Marbo Product d.o.o. Beograd, Marbo d.o.o. Laktasi, Matudis - Comercio de Produtos Alimentares Limitada, Matutano - Sociedade de Produtos Alimentares Lda., Mid-America Improvement Corporation, Mountainview Insurance Company Inc., Muscle Milk, NCJV LLC, New Bern Transport Corporation, New Century Beverage Company LLC, Noble Leasing LLC, Northeast Hot-Fill Co-op Inc., Office at Solyanka LLC, Onbiso Inversiones S.L., One World Enterprises LLC, One World Investors Inc., P-A Barbados Bottling Company LLC, P-A Bottlers Barbados SRL, P-Americas LLC, PAS Luxembourg S.a r.l, PAS Netherlands B.V., PBG Canada Holdings II LLC, PBG Canada Holdings Inc., PBG Cyprus Holdings Limited, PBG Investment Partnership, PBG Midwest Holdings S.a r.l, PBG Soda Can Holdings S.a r.l, PCBL LLC, PCNA Manufacturing Inc., PR Beverages Cyprus Holding Limited, PR Beverages Cyprus Russia Holding Limited, PRB Luxembourg S.a r.l, PRS Inc., PSAS Inversiones LLC, PSE Logistica S.R.L., PT Quaker Indonesia, Papas Chips S.A., Pei N.V., Pep Trade LLC, Pepsi B.V., Pepsi Beverages Holdings Inc., Pepsi Bottling Group Global Finance LLC, Pepsi Bottling Group GmbH, Pepsi Bottling Group Hoosiers B.V., Pepsi Bottling Holdings Inc., Pepsi Bugshan Investments S.A.E., Pepsi Cola Colombia Ltda, Pepsi Cola Egypt S.A.E., Pepsi Cola Panamericana S.R.L., Pepsi Cola Servis Ve Dagitim Limited Sirketi, Pepsi Cola Trading Ireland, Pepsi Logistics Company Inc., Pepsi Northwest Beverages LLC, Pepsi Overseas Investments Partnership, Pepsi Promotions Inc., Pepsi-Cola Advertising and Marketing Inc., Pepsi-Cola Bermuda Limited, Pepsi-Cola Bottlers Holding C.V., Pepsi-Cola Bottling Company Of St. Louis Inc., Pepsi-Cola Bottling Company of Ft. Lauderdale-Palm Beach LLC, Pepsi-Cola Company, Pepsi-Cola Ecuador Cia. Ltda., Pepsi-Cola Far East Trade Development Co. Inc., Pepsi-Cola Finance LLC, Pepsi-Cola General Bottlers Poland Sp. z o.o., Pepsi-Cola Industrial da Amazonia Ltda., Pepsi-Cola International Cork, Pepsi-Cola International LLC, Pepsi-Cola International Limited, Pepsi-Cola International Limited U.S.A., Pepsi-Cola International Private Limited, Pepsi-Cola Korea Co. Ltd., Pepsi-Cola Management and Administrative Services Inc., Pepsi-Cola Manufacturing Company Of Uruguay S.R.L., Pepsi-Cola Manufacturing International Limited, Pepsi-Cola Manufacturing Mediterranean Limited, Pepsi-Cola Marketing Corp. Of P.R. Inc., Pepsi-Cola Mediterranean Ltd., Pepsi-Cola Metropolitan Bottling Company Inc., Pepsi-Cola Mexicana Holdings LLC, Pepsi-Cola Mexicana S. de R.L. de C.V., Pepsi-Cola National Marketing LLC, Pepsi-Cola Operating Company Of Chesapeake And Indianapolis, Pepsi-Cola Sales and Distribution Inc., Pepsi-Cola Technical Operations Inc., Pepsi-Cola Thai Trading Co. Ltd., Pepsi-Cola de Honduras S.R.L., Pepsi-Cola of Corvallis Inc., PepsiAmericas Nemzetkozi Szolgaltato Korlatolt Felelossegu Tarsasag, PepsiCo ANZ Holdings Pty Ltd, PepsiCo Alimentos Antioquia Ltda., PepsiCo Alimentos Colombia Ltda., PepsiCo Alimentos Ecuador Cia. Ltda., PepsiCo Alimentos Z.F. Ltda., PepsiCo Alimentos de Bolivia S.R.L., PepsiCo Amacoco Bebidas Do Brasil Ltda., PepsiCo Asia Research & Development Center Company Limited, PepsiCo Australia Financing Cyprus Limited, PepsiCo Australia Financing Limited Partnership, PepsiCo Australia Financing Partner 1 LLC, PepsiCo Australia Financing Partner 2 LLC, PepsiCo Australia Financing Pty Ltd, PepsiCo Australia Holdings Pty Limited, PepsiCo Australia International, PepsiCo Austria Services GmbH, PepsiCo Azerbaijan Limited Liability Company, PepsiCo BeLux BV, PepsiCo Beverage Sales LLC, PepsiCo Beverage Singapore Pty Ltd, PepsiCo Beverages Bermuda Limited, PepsiCo Beverages Hong Kong Limited, PepsiCo Beverages International Limited, PepsiCo Beverages Italia Societa' A Responsabilita' Limitata, PepsiCo Canada Finance LLC, PepsiCo Canada Holdings ULC, PepsiCo Canada Investment ULC, PepsiCo Canada ULC, PepsiCo Captive Holdings Inc., PepsiCo Caribbean Inc., PepsiCo China Limited, PepsiCo Consulting Polska Sp. z o.o., PepsiCo De Bolivia S.R.L., PepsiCo Del Paraguay S.R.L., PepsiCo Deutschland GmbH, PepsiCo Eesti AS, PepsiCo Euro Bermuda Limited, PepsiCo Euro Finance Antilles B.V., PepsiCo Europe Support Center S.L., PepsiCo Finance Americas Company, PepsiCo Finance Antilles A N.V., PepsiCo Finance Antilles B N.V., PepsiCo Finance South Africa Proprietary Limited, PepsiCo Financial Shared Services Inc., PepsiCo Food & Beverage Holdings Hong Kong Limited, PepsiCo Foods A.I.E., PepsiCo Foods China Company Limited, PepsiCo Foods Group Pty Ltd, PepsiCo Foods Guangdong Co. Ltd., PepsiCo Foods Nigeria Limited, PepsiCo Foods Private Limited, PepsiCo Foods Sichuan Co. Ltd., PepsiCo Foods Taiwan Co. Ltd., PepsiCo Foods Vietnam Company, PepsiCo France SAS, PepsiCo Global Business Services India LLP, PepsiCo Global Business Services Poland Sp. z o.o., PepsiCo Global Holdings Limited, PepsiCo Global Investments B.V., PepsiCo Global Investments S.a r.l, PepsiCo Global Mobility LLC, PepsiCo Global Real Estate Inc., PepsiCo Global Trading Solutions Unlimited Company, PepsiCo Golden Holdings Inc., PepsiCo Group Finance International B.V., PepsiCo Group Holdings International B.V., PepsiCo Group Spotswood Holdings S.a r.l, PepsiCo Gulf International FZE, PepsiCo Hellas Single Member Industrial and Commercial Societe Anonyme, PepsiCo Holding de Espana S.L., PepsiCo Holdings, PepsiCo Holdings LLC, PepsiCo Holdings Toshkent LLC, PepsiCo Hong Kong LLC, PepsiCo Iberia Servicios Centrales S.L., PepsiCo India Holdings Private Limited, PepsiCo India Sales Private Limited, PepsiCo Internacional Mexico S. de R. L. de C. V., PepsiCo International Hong Kong Limited, PepsiCo International Limited, PepsiCo International Pte Ltd., PepsiCo Investments Europe I B.V., PepsiCo Investments Ltd., PepsiCo Ireland Food & Beverages Unlimited Company, PepsiCo Japan Co. Ltd., PepsiCo Light B.V., PepsiCo Logistyka Sp. z o.o., PepsiCo Malaysia Sdn. Bhd., PepsiCo Management Services SAS, PepsiCo Manufacturing A.I.E., PepsiCo Max B.V., PepsiCo Mexico Holdings S. de R.L. de C.V., PepsiCo Nederland B.V., PepsiCo Nordic Denmark ApS, PepsiCo Nordic Finland Oy, PepsiCo Nordic Norway AS, PepsiCo Nutrition Trading DMCC, PepsiCo One B.V., PepsiCo Overseas Corporation, PepsiCo Overseas Financing Partnership, PepsiCo Panimex Inc, PepsiCo Products B.V., PepsiCo Products FLLC, PepsiCo Puerto Rico Inc., PepsiCo Sales Inc., PepsiCo Sales LLC, PepsiCo Services Asia Ltd., PepsiCo Services CZ s.r.o., PepsiCo Services LLC, PepsiCo Twist B.V., PepsiCo UK Pension Plan Trustee Limited, PepsiCo Ventures B.V., PepsiCo Wave Holdings LLC, PepsiCo World Trading Company Inc., PepsiCo Y LLC, PepsiCo de Argentina S.R.L., PepsiCo de Mexico S. de R.L. de C.V., PepsiCo do Brasil Industria e Comercio de Alimentos Ltda., PepsiCo do Brasil Ltda., PepsiCola Interamericana de Guatemala S.A., Pet Iberia S.L., Pete & Johnny Limited, Pine International LLC, Pine International Limited, Pinstripe Leasing LLC, Pioneer Food Group Pty Ltd, Pioneer Foods Groceries Pty Ltd, Pioneer Foods Group Ltd., Pioneer Foods Holdings Pty Ltd, Pioneer Foods Pty Ltd, Pioneer Foods UK Ltd, Pioneer Foods Wellingtons Pty Ltd, Pipers Crisps Limited, PlayCo Inc., Pop corners, PopCorners Holdings Inc., Portfolio Concentrate Solutions Unlimited Company, Premier Nutrition Trading L.L.C., Prestwick LLC, Prev PepsiCo Sociedade Previdenciaria, Productos Alimenticios Rene LLC, Productos S.A.S. C.V., Productos SAS Management B.V., Punch N.V., Punica Getranke GmbH, Q O Puerto Rico Inc., QFL OHQ Sdn. Bhd., QTG Development Inc., QTG Services Inc., Quadrant - Amroq Beverages S.R.L., Quaker Development B.V., Quaker European Beverages LLC, Quaker European Investments B.V., Quaker Foods, Quaker Global Investments B.V., Quaker Holdings UK Limited, Quaker Manufacturing LLC, Quaker Oats Asia Inc., Quaker Oats Australia Pty Ltd, Quaker Oats B.V., Quaker Oats Capital Corporation, Quaker Oats Europe Inc., Quaker Oats Europe LLC, Quaker Oats Limited, Quaker Sales & Distribution Inc, Raptas Finance S.a r.l., Rare Fare Foods LLC, Rare Fare Holdings Inc., Reading Industries Ltd, Real Estate Holdings LLC, Rockstar Energy Drink, Rolling Frito-Lay Sales LP, S & T of Mississippi Inc., SIH International LLC, SVC Logistics Inc., SVC Manufacturing Inc., SVE Russia Holdings GmbH, Sabritas LLC, Sabritas S. de R.L. de C.V., Sabritas Snacks America Latina de Nicaragua y Cia Ltda, Sabritas de Costa Rica S. de R.L., Sabritas y Cia. S en C de C.V., Sakata Rice Snacks Australia Pty Ltd, Sandora Holdings B.V., Saudi Snack Foods Company Limited, Sea Eagle International SRL, Seepoint Holdings Ltd., Senselet Food Processing PLC, Senselet Holding B.V., Servicios GBF Sociedad de Responsabilidad Limitada, Servicios GFLG y Compania Limitada, Servicios Gamesa Puerto Rico L.L.C., Servicios SYC S. de R.L. de C.V., Seven-Up Asia Inc., Seven-Up Light B.V., Seven-Up Nederland B.V., Shanghai PepsiCo Snack Company Limited, Shanghai YuHo Agricultural Development Co. Ltd, Shoebill LLC, Simba (Proprietary) Limited, Simba Proprietary Limited, Sitka Spruce, Smartfoods Inc., Smiles and Bites Holdings S.de R.L. de C.V., Smiths Crisps Limited, Snack Food Investments GmbH, Snack Food Investments II GmbH, Snack Food Investments Limited, Snack Food-Beverage Asia Products Limited, Snacks America Latina S.R.L., Snacks Guatemala Ltd., So Spark Ltd., Soda-Club CO2 Atlantic GmbH, Soda-Club CO2 GmbH, Soda-Club CO2 Ltd., Soda-Club Switzerland GmbH, Soda-Club Worldwide B.V., SodaStream, SodaStream Australia Pty Ltd, SodaStream CO2 SA, SodaStream Canada Ltd., SodaStream Enterprises N.V., SodaStream France SAS, SodaStream GmbH, SodaStream Iberia S.L., SodaStream Industries Ltd., SodaStream International B.V., SodaStream International Ltd., SodaStream Israel Ltd., SodaStream K.K., SodaStream New Zealand Ltd., SodaStream Nordics AB, SodaStream Poland Sp. z o.o., SodaStream SA Pty Ltd., SodaStream Switzerland GmbH, SodaStream USA Inc., SodaStream Osterreich GmbH, South Beach Beverage Company Inc., South Properties Inc., Spitz International Inc., Sportmex Internacional S.A. de C.V., Springboig Industries Ltd, Spruce Limited, Stacy's Pita Chip Company Incorporated, Star Foods E.M. S.R.L., Stokely-Van Camp Inc., Stratosphere Communications Pty Ltd, Stratosphere Holdings 2018 Limited, Streamfoods Ltd, TFL Holdings LLC, Tasman Finance S.a r.l, The Gatorade Company, The Good Carb Food Company Ltd., The Pepsi Bottling Group Canada ULC, The Quaker Oats Company, The Smith's Snackfood Company Pty Limited, Thomond Group Holdings Limited, Tobago Snack Holdings LLC, Tropicana Alvalle S.L., Tropicana Beverages Limited, Tropicana Europe N.V., Tropicana United Kingdom Limited, Troya-Ultra LLC, United Foods Companies Restaurantes S.A., V-Water, VentureCo Israel Ltd, Veurne Snack Foods BV, Vitamin Brands Ltd., Walkers Crisps Limited, Walkers Group Limited, Walkers Snack Foods Limited, Walkers Snacks Distribution Limited, Walkers Snacks Limited, Whitman Corporation, Whitman Insurance Co. Ltd., Wimm-Bill-Dann Beverages JSC, Wimm-Bill-Dann Brands Co. Ltd., Wimm-Bill-Dann Central Asia-Almaty LLP, Wimm-Bill-Dann Foods LLC, Wimm-Bill-Dann Georgia Ltd., Wimm-Bill-Dann JSC, and Wimm-Bill-Dann Ukraine PJSC. Read More On Tuesday night (November 7), nearly 300 donors and friends gathered for Dalhousies donor recognition event in Halifax, celebrating philanthropy and the incredible impact it has on the university. And years event included the unveiling of a new giving society that celebrates those whose commitment to giving spans decades. The MacLennan Society recognizes Dalhousies most loyal donors and is aptly named after Rod MacLennan (BSc60, LLD98) the first alumnus to reach 50 years of consecutive giving. The Truro native and former Scotsburn executive first began giving to Dal as a student and has continued throughout his life. While MacLennan is the first to reach such a milestone, he was welcomed into the society along with some 6,500 other donors across three milestones: 50 years of giving (out of a 60-year span), 25 years (out of a 30-year span) and 10 years (out of a 15-year span). As a group, they are consistent donors who continue to give to a cause they believe in. Dalhousie President and Vice-Chancellor Richard Florizone commended Dal donors' loyalty and generosity and highlighted the many ways in which they make a difference. Your partnership allows us to continue our history of inclusivity in higher education from our humble beginnings as Canadas first non-denominational university to todays efforts to build learning environments in which everyone belongs, he said. It is fueling innovation in science, technology, engineering, and business. It is bringing opportunities and entrepreneurship to our region. We do this because we believe in our communities, and we are only able to do so because our communities you believe in us. Honouring a half-century of support As for the namesake of the society, his commitment is evident by his loyal and diverse giving. Rod MacLennans first gift to Dalhousie happened after his freshman year, when his strong marks had earned him a modest scholarship. His late father, Charles, a Dal graduate himself, encouraged him to donate the money back to someone else who can benefit. Thus began MacLennans legacy of giving back to his alma mater. Over the years, MacLennan has established scholarships and bursaries in Nursing, Theatre, Music and Science each named after a family member or respected professor who had come to Dalhousie before him. A Truro native, he has long supported the former Agricultural College (now Dals Faculty of Agriculture). He continues to support the Dal Tigers, in particular the mens volleyball team a tribute to his own volleyball days at Dal. And he has given generously to the Dalhousie Medical Research Foundation, both as philanthropist as well as volunteer, serving on its board from 1997-2016 and currently as a member of its Advisory Board. A humble man, MacLennan spoke briefly but fondly at the event of his familys deep connection to the university and acknowledged donors, like himself, who are enriching Dalhousie through their generosity. Student impact and the power of partnership Tim Disher, (BSc11, BSc14), a PhD student in Nursing whose research focuses on neonatal care, was able to speak to the impact of philanthropy first-hand. A recipient of the Electa MacLennan Memorial Scholarship, an award funded by Rod MacLennan in memory of his aunt who was the first director of Nursing at Dalhousie, Disher (pictured above) expressed the incredible impact that donor support has had on him and his studies and career: I would not be who I am had you not all been who you are, so thank you for your support. Fittingly, the event was held at Shirreff Hall, itself a nod to philanthropy and its incredible impact on the university. In 1920, nurse Jennie Shirreff Eddy gave $300,000 to establish Dals first womens residence. Mrs. Shirreff Eddy is just one example of donors who have shaped our history over the last 200 years through generosity and partnership, said Dr. Florizone. Philanthropy has been an important part of our storyand so are all of you. President Florizone with Rod MacLennan. Veriest solutions opened its new state-of-the-art facilities in Belgrade and new offices in Novi Sad and Nis. November 8, 2017Veriest Solutions, a leading Israeli Electronics Design Services house, is expanding its European market presence. Veriest announced the official opening of its new state-of-the-art facilities in Belgrade and two new offices in Novi Sad and Nis, Serbia. Veriest operates in Serbia since 2010. In the last years, the company has been experiencing a major expansion phase, with additional international clients and advanced projects. The new office in Belgrade, twice the size of the previous one, was inaugurated on 31st of October, 2017 in the presence of guests of honor, Mr. Zoran Djordjevic, Minister of Labor, Employment, Veterans and Social Policy of the Republic of Serbia alongside the Israeli Ambassador, Dr. Alona Fisher-Kamm. The event was also attended by representatives of the Serbian academic and business circles, besides Veriests management and professional team. Minister Djordjevic said that Veriests expansion is a good indicator, as it showed that the company believes in Serbia and its young people. I believe that IT is a good future for Serbia. There are already 20,000 people working in this field. Some estimates say that, by 2020, there will be 50,000 people working in the field of IT, which is an indication for the young which direction to take added Mr. Djordjevic, while taking a tour of the company's spacious new premises. According to ambassador Fisher-Kamm, Veriest was the first Israeli technology company to operate in Serbia and expressed the hope that this positive experience would motivate other companies to follow suit. Moshe Zalcberg, CEO of Veriest, added: Thanks to the talent, involvement, commitment and dedication of this team, we continue growing our operations. Our customers worldwide fully trust our engineers with their most important projects. From computers to memory chips, from automotive to neural networks and more. Veriest new spacious offices, offers engineers a modern working environment that allows the company to better serve its increasing clients portfolio. Additionally, the company has opened several new positions for talented engineers to staff interesting projects. China Telecom is reportedly considering an acquisition of a majority holding in Brazils Oi for BRL20 billion ($6 billion). Reportedly, Oi will need to resolve the debt problems that have plagued it before China Telecom will agree to a deal. The beleaguered Brazilian operator is due to meet its creditors on 10th November in an attempt to reach an agreement. Last week, Ois future was discussed in a meeting held in the countrys capital of Brasilia between Brazilian government officials and agents from China Telecom and US private equity firm TPG Capital. China Telecoms bid for a majority stake reportedly involves building out a fibre network to over 2000 principalities, which would massively boost Brazils deployment of high-speed broadband. Ois most recent proposal to restructure its debt was approved by its board, and has been submitted to its creditors ahead of its meeting with them, during which a vote on the operators future will be held. A committee of bondholders shot down its previous debt proposal last month, with the operators managers in turn rejecting a counter proposal from creditors that held BRL23 billion of liabilities. The operator first filed for bankruptcy protection in June 2016 and has since been holding negotiations to restructure its debt. If its latest proposals are again rejected, Oi could face liquidation. It is the fourth biggest wireless provider in Brazil with 40 million connections, and also offers broadband, fixed line and TV services. Mexicos regulator IFT has amended regulation that forbade market leader America Movil from charging termination fees to its rival operators. The reinstatement of termination charges was approved by the Mexican Supreme Court in August. The ruling is a huge boon to America Movil, and marks the first significant repeal of regulatory reforms introduced in 2014 that were aimed at reducing the market leaders dominance in Mexico in order to foster competition. America Movil had argued in court that it had been unfairly targeted these measures, noting that they were asymmetrical in that rival operators were still able to charge termination fees to the market leader. The operator added that it had seen its margins adversely affected as well as losing certain business rights. While the 2014 reforms were aimed at reducing America Movils dominance in Mexico, it still enjoys a market share of around 70%, and its rival operators including AT&T had been pushing for IFT to keep the interconnection rate at or around zero. An AT&T spokesperson said: We are disappointed because the new interconnection tariff is a step backwards on the path toward delivering on the objective of the reforms [which] helps the preponderant and harms consumers and competitors. Charges will be reintroduced from 1st January 2018, with rates set by IFT using a model derived from a consultation process that it began in 2016. It marginally favours America Movils rivals, who will be able to charge MXN0.112799 per minute for mobile calls terminated on their networks, while the market leader will be able to charge MXN0.038562 ($0.002) per minute. IFT said in a statement: The establishment of interconnection tariffs based on costs is a regulatory policy mechanism that aims to balance competition, reduce the disadvantages derived from the size of the network, and allow smaller companies to have tariff plans that position them competitively in the provision of the service. French Internet Peering Service Provider France-IX rapidly expanded its presence in Africa in 2017, positioning itself for African networks and content providers wishing to peer with its community of several hundreds of carriers, ISPs and content delivery networks. In addition, 2017 is seeing France-IX continue its programme of supporting the creation of new IXPs in Africa, the establishment of which is an important step in fostering Internet-based economic growth. This support mainly consists in providing training, equipment donation and technical assistance. France-IX started this initiative with CASIX in Morocco, followed by SENIX in Senegal, and is now planning to help Benin and Congo. The rapid expansion of the France-IX community in Africa is due to a combination of new peering members joining the IXP in both its Paris and Marseille hubs and new connections via its remote peering partners with presence in Africa. Three new African networks Angola Cables, Djibouti Telecom and Mauritius Telecom were connected in 2017, bringing the total number of African members in the France-IX Paris and Marseille peering community to ten (adding to AFR-IX, Gulfsat Madagascar, Ooredoo Tunisia, Oranlink/Islalink, Seacom, Telma and WIOCC). Three new remote peering partners also joined in 2017 AFR-IX, Angola Cables and Telecom Italia Sparkle. Along with existing partner, BICS, these remote peering partners are now enabling more than 70% of African countries with French as its official first language to reach France-IX via a remote peering solution. We support the rapid expansion of Internet connectivity on the African continent by offering affordable, reliable, low-latency Internet peering services from France, said Franck Simon, President at France-IX. We are also looking forward to collaborating on the development of two new African IXPs, as this is a crucial part of building a sustainable domestic Internet ecosystem and their creation will stand as a positive marker of economic and social improvement. Africa, which is experiencing the most rapid growth of international Internet bandwidth, grew at a compound annual rate of 44% between 2013 and 2017. France-IX both contributes and benefits from this growth as 15% of its Marseille members are African ISPs who represent 30% of the total traffic exchanged in France-IX Marseille (with total traffic currently peaking at 100 Gbps). Why do you buy a Pixel phone? Because Google updates it every month. And it is through the first of these updates that Google is fixing a much talked about issue on the Pixel 2 XL. The November patch for the device brings the Saturated colour mode on the device, allowing warmer colours on the phone. The move is in response to users and reviewers complaining of washed out and desaturated colours on the display. So, does Googles update work? The short answer is yes, but its the long answer you should care about. But first Heres how to get to that new Saturated mode. You enter Settings, find the Display option, tap Advanced and then tap Colors. Here you will see the Natural, Boosted and Saturated options. The Natural mode sets the Pixel 2 XL to the washed out mess it has been so far, while the Boosted mode doesnt help much either. The Saturated mode, though, makes a noticeable difference to colours on the screen. To get to it faster, you can simply enter Settings and search for Color on the search bar on top. Its worth noting that Google offered a Vivid mode earlier, which has now been replaced by the new options. Saturated mode As the name suggests, the mode turns up the colour temperature on the display. So youll get warmer tones. As soon as you tap the mode, youll see a noticeable yellowish shift on the otherwise white Settings screen. Its a tad tough to notice at first, but youll see it if you concentrate on the top bar that says Colors, youll notice the white shifting to a slight yellowish version. That may sound unnatural, but its indeed what most consumers want today. Notice the warmer toned on the Chrome logo and the phone's wallpaper You will notice warmer colours on the top bar in the Settings menu We tested this with some of our usual images, colour charts and regular use-cases. And we can confirm that the display indeed looks much warmer and pleasant compared to what it was. That said, you shouldnt expect Samsung Galaxy Note 8 level colour saturation, which itself is too high to begin with. While the display is indeed warmer, don't expect it to be as warm as on Samsung's phones Its clear that Google is trying to meet the consumer halfway here. The saturated mode delivers punchier colours, but if youre used to oversaturated tones you may still be disappointed. In our opinion, the saturated mode on the Pixel 2 XL looks good and attractive. Blue tint But that doesnt end all of the Pixel 2 XLs woes. The blue tint when viewed off angles remains a real problem and theres really nothing Google can do about it, since its a hardware issue. Youll see the colour shift from slight angles, which may still put you off. Should I buy the Pixel 2 XL? While our verdict on the Pixel 2 XL doesnt change with this update, the new display settings does take its rating up from 75 to 76. Since Google cant fix the blue tint, the phone remains somewhat underwhelming in our opinion, though it has an exceptional camera. Considering the display alone, the Pixel 2 XL doesnt hold a candle to the iPhone X or Samsung Galaxy Note 8. Heres the Pixel 2 XL review. What else does the update bring? Barring the colour modes, the update also adds measures to avoid screen burn-in. The screen brightness has been reduced by a very slight margin, which you wont notice at all. Other than that, the navigation bar now fades out whenever it is not used for extended periods. Lastly, the Pixel 2 XL is now safe against the recently unearthed KRACK WiFi vulnerability. A general strike organised by independence supporters in Catalonia has left many of the regions roads blocked, bringing much of its industry to a standstill as several local government officials remain in jail. In the early hours of Wednesday morning in the troubled north-eastern region, thousands of protesters took to the streets, blocking traffic and causing severe traffic jams across the city of Barcelona and other areas. Much of the action focused on major routes in and out of the regions biggest city. The strike took place in response to the detainment of eight former ministers of the local Catalan government, who were jailed for their roles in the independence referendum on 1 October and subsequent declaration of secession from Spain. Also on Wednesday, the Constitutional Court in Madrid formally annulled the unilateral declaration made by the Catalan parliament on 27 October. Catalonia now awaits elections on 21 December in which pro-independence parties may still be in the majority in the local parliament. Former president Carles Puigdemont, who remains in Brussels despite calls for him to be returned to Spain, may also be able to participate in the elections. US President Donald Trump has warned North Korea and its leader Kim Jong-un to "not underestimate" his administration, and also called on Russia and China to sever economic ties with the regime. Trump made a speech at the South Korea National Assembly in Seoul on Wednesday, following a conference in which he urged Pyongyang to begin talks about denuclearisation. He said that it would be a "fatal miscalculation" for North Korea to believe that his government would adopt the same attitude as its predecessors. "Every step you take down this dark path, increases the peril you face," Trump said. "The regime has interpreted America's past restraint as weakness, this would be a fatal miscalculation. This is a very different administration." Trump added in a direct command to Pyongyang: "Do not underestimate us, and do not try us." Having already travelled to Japan, Trump will also make stops in China, Vietnam and the Philippines on his tour of Asia, where the key themes will be how to deal with Korea and trade policy. In response to Trumps speech, the regime said it would no longer listen to Trumps comments. "We don't care about what that mad dog may utter because we've already heard enough," North Korean officials told CNN. European stocks are still trading slighty lower come midday in the wake of weaker-than-expected data on Chinese foreign trade. As of 1300 GMT, the benchmark Stoxx 600 was 0.21% or 0.82 points lower to 393.83, alongside a dip of 0.02% or 2.01 points for the German Dax which was at 13,377.96. The FTSE Mibtel meanwhile was retreating by 0.63% or 144.42 points to 22,818.17. In parallel, euro-dollar was edging higher by 0.02% to 1.1594 and January-dated Brent crude oil futures 0.43% down at $63.42 on the ICE. The rate of growth in Chinese exports slipped from a 9.0% pace year-on-year for September to 6.1% in October (consensus: 7.0%), while import growth cooled from a 19.5% clip to 17.5% (consensus: 17.0%). Yet according to Julian Evans-Pritchard at Capital Economics the chief factor behind the 'miss' in Wednesday's figures was the shift in the Mid-Autumn festival this year. "The upshot is that, after adjusting for seasonal factors and price effects, both outbound and inbound shipments appear to have softened recently. Looking ahead, we expect any further weakening of exports to remain mild given the relatively upbeat outlook for growth in Chinas main trading partners," said Julian Evans-Pritchard at Capital Economics. Back in Europe, Spain's national statistics office, INE, reported that the country's industrial production grew at a 3.4% clip year-on-year in September (consensus: 3.2%). Meanwhile, in France, Finance Ministry data revealed a seasonally adjusted -4.7bn shortfall on the foreign trade balance in September, as expected by economists. GlaxoSmithKline has appointed Hal Barron - currently president of research & development at Alphabet-funded Calico - as chief scientific officer and president of R&D, replacing Patrick Vallance. Vallance will leave the company at the end of March next year to take up the role of chief scientific adviser to the UK government and head of the Office for Science. Barron will join GSK on 1 January. Prior to joining Calico, which uses advanced technologies to increase understanding of lifespan biology, Barron was executive vice president, head of global product development and chief medical officer of Roche, responsible for all the products in the combined portfolio of Roche and Genentech. At Genentech, he was senior vice president of development and chief medical officer. Glaxo chief executive Emma Walmsley said: "Scientific innovation must be at the heart of GSK and with the appointment of Hal, we are bringing one of the world's foremost R&D leaders to the company. "Hal has exceptional experience and a strong track record of developing significant new medicines from his time at Roche and Genentech; whilst at Calico he has helped build a research organisation that uses cutting-edge technologies in drug discovery and development. He is also very well known for his integrity, for being a clinician who is committed to always doing the best he can for patients and for building exceptional teams. "The fusion of science and technology is fast transforming pharmaceuticals R&D. With Hal, we have a new R&D leader who will drive the changes and choices we need to make to be successful in this new environment, and as we look to build the next wave of growth for the company." Barron will be based in the US and operating from offices in both San Francisco and Stevenage in the UK. The new office presence in San Francisco will be focused on business development for R&D. At 1435 GMT, the shares were up 1.5% to 1,363p. Theresa May is reportedly close to sacking international development secretary Priti Patel over a series of undisclosed meetings she had while on holiday in Israel, though the Prime Minister came under pressure herself after reports emerged that her office knew more than it let on. Patel has been under pressure for failing to notify Theresa May about 12 meetings she attended in August of this year, but a further two meetings have been revealed, landing her in further trouble. May has ordered Patel back from a trip to Uganda and is expected to arrive back to the UK on Wednesday. But it emerged on Wednesday that May's 10 Downing Street office instructed Patel not remove mentions of a meeting with an official from Israel's foreign ministry in New York in September as it would embarrass the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the Jewish Chronicle reported. Furthermore, the Chronicle revealed that although Patels meeting with Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu was not authorised in advance, the British government was made aware of it within hours. Prominent Brexiteer Patel and her deputy, Middle East minister Alistair Burt, were forced to apologise on Monday for the undisclosed meetings, which were held without government officials during a family holiday earlier this year. It was reported on Tuesday that May was not informed of Patels plans to use taxpayers money to fund the Israeli armed forces to treat refugees in the Golan Heights region. On the same day Patel met Netanyahu, Burt and British Ambassador to Israel David Quarrey met Michael Oren, Deputy Minister at the Israeli Prime Ministers Office, where it a preceding meeting with Netanyahu was noted. Number 10 stated that May was in the dark over the meeting with Netanyahu for more than two months, until last Friday. But the JC reported that May spoke to Patel in advance of the UN General Assembly in September and they discussed the her meeting with Mr Netanyahu, as well as the details of Patels plan for UK aid to be shared with Israel. Mays cabinet was already riven by major divides over Brexit and this week there have been calls for Boris Johnson to resign as Foreign Secretary for endangering a British citizen in Iran. Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a British journalist, was last year arrested and jailed for five years in Tehran, having been accused of plotting the downfall of the government. Johnson wrongly said she had been training journalists in the country, with his comments being used as evidence against the charity worker. MPs have launched a formal inquiry into household finances, as personal debt hits levels unseen since the financial crisis. The Treasury select committee will examine the debt levels of UK households as well as whether consumers are saving adequately as Britain leaves the European Union. Problem debt and the treatment of low income families by banks will also form part of the inquiry. - Guardian Working families on low incomes will be among the biggest losers when the next recession hits, after their finances were weakened by welfare spending cuts in the wake of the 2008 financial crash. The Institute for Fiscal Studies, a leading tax and spending watchdog, said plans for a reduction in tax credits which boost the incomes of low paid workers will take a particularly large toll on households where one or more adults face cuts in hours or lower wages. Guardian Sky has warned it could close down Sky News if it proves a sticking point with regulators in its 11.7bn takeover by Murdoch-owned 21st Century Fox. The threat to review the future of the news channel if a deal is blocked was made in a submission by Sky to the UK Competition and Markets Authority. The body is undertaking a six-month investigation into whether Fox's purchase of the remaining 61pc of Sky it does not already own would limit media plurality and affect broadcasting standards. Telegraph Twitter is giving all of its users the ability to post 280-character tweets, double the length of the 140-character limit that has defined the social network since its inception. The company provoked a fierce backlash from its famously vocal user base when it started to test the change in September. Telegraph The hotel company behind the Principal and De Vere brands has appointed advisers to look at a sale valuing the business at more than 1.2 billion. Starwood Capital Group, the American investment firm, is understood to have taken on UBS to advise it on strategic options for the Principal Hotel Company ranging from a refinancing to an outright disposal. The Times The fashion among South African buyers for snapping up British retailers has reached Hobbs, the upmarket womens clothing chain favoured by the Duchess of Cambridge. The Foschini Group, already the owner of Hobbs high street peers Phase Eight and Whistles, has bought the business from 3i, the listed private equity firm; 3i had bought Hobbs for 111 million in 2004 and was understood to have been marketing it for 80 million this year. The Times Industry, science, business, government and technology need to come together and act now, said Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte at the opening of the 4th edition of the Amsterdam International Water Week (AIWW). Rutte addressed the big challenge for the global water community to meet the water demand when the world population will reach the 9 billion mark by 2050. The International Water Week is a great platform to forge new alliances, he said. By attracting over 20,000 visitors to the Aquatech Amsterdam trade fair and over 1,100 delegates to attend the AIWW conference, the event met the Prime Ministers expectations to the fullest extent. A remarkable output of AIWW 2017 are the nine Amsterdam Agreements, signed by case owners, experts, suppliers and investors to solve complex water issues and bring solutions to scale. They pledged to report back on their progress at the next AIWW in 2019. The next Amsterdam International Water Week will take place from 4 8 November 2019. Below a selection of photos, giving an impression of the whole event, including the conference and trade exhibition. Crowd-puller: the Innovation Avenue State-of-art water treatment technology had been gathered along one walkway. The Innovation Avenue was a big crowd-puller at the Aquatech Amsterdam trade fair that had a record breaking 928 exhibitors from around the world. Amsterdam Agreements on breakthrough projects Nine Amsterdam Agreements were signed by unique coalitions that in the spotlight of the global water community want to achieve breakthroughs. One of the agreements was signed by the public-private Human Cities Coalition that works on the improvement of the settlements in megacities. Better valuing of water The value of water is more than just its price at the tap. Special Dutch water envoy Henk Ovink (left) travelled around the world to collect reactions on the concept of five principles that should lead to a better valuing of water, including environment, culture and local social circumstances. Ovink collected the reactions at the AIWW in a suitcase that he presented to Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte who is also a member of the High Level Panel on Water. In the coming months the panel is expected to adopt the principles. Monetizing pee and poop Dutch practitioner Samuel Sarphati came in from the afterlife and met the winners of the awards named after him. Sarphati collected excretes from toilets in Amsterdam some 150 years ago and brought it outside the city to use it as fertiliser to grow crops. Today award winners Sasha Kramer and Abhijit Banerji follow in his footsteps to monitize pee and poop as fertiliers to grow crops in Haiti and India. Who's afraid of red, yellow and blue Pump supplier Pentair Fairbanks Nijhuis displayed a split case pump painted in the typical cubic style of Piet Mondriaan. The famous Dutch painter started his career in Winterswijk where Nijhuis Pompen has its production location. This year the Netherlands celebrates the centenary of De Stijl abstract art movement with Piet Mondriaan as its best known member. Water stress as driver of conflicts Water scarcity may not be the only driver of conflicts but it surely is a powerful one. That was the message by the expert panel at a session on the avoidance of conflicts and migration. The water community can contribute by improving the availability of water in countries or regions where there is social unrest already and harvests are failing. Former Dutch water minister Melanie Schultz van Haegen (left at the table) called for defence ministers to get involved and prevent conflicts to escalate. Sandy joins Andy, Ana and Theo Its all in the - Paques - family. Water technology supplier Paques introduced a new member to its bug family that represents the company at mayor water technology exhibitions in the world. Brown coloured Sandy (right) has been added, representing Pauqes Astrasand sand filter. Great time for young water professionals Young water professionals met awesome waterholics from Mali, Czech, Norway, Columbia, US, Singapore, Australia, Oman, Germany, Korea, UK and the Netherlands. They had a great time discussing water issues in the arena of their own pavilion. Photoshoot city leaders The AIWW Conference had three Leader forums, one on the industry, one on the utilities and one of cities. The Cities Leaders Forum with representatives from over 50 different cities had a group photoshoot following their round table session. Cities realise they need to forge new partnerships with stakeholders, including business and citizens, to curve the linear water supply to a more circular one. If we do not act. A graph that says it all. It was presented by Lydia Whyatt, director of Resonance, specialised in advising institutional investors in asset investment funds. She showed the predicted increase of the water demand by the industry and the power sector (in Bric countries and worldwide) as a result of the expected improvement of the living standards for 9 billion people by 2050. (photos by Rob Kamminga and Jac van Tuijn) Read also on this website AIWW 2017: Sarphati Sanitation Award winners urge financers to boost sanitation services, 6 November 2017 AIWW 2017: Rain triggered fish passage wins Wetskills young professionals challenge, 6 November 2017 AIWW 2017: Ambitious coalitions want to realize new breakthroughs in the world, 3 November 2017 AIWW 2017: Sightseeing hot stuff at Aquatechs Innovation Avenue, 3 November 2017 AIWW 2017: Game-changing WWTP-technology CoRe Water launched at Aquatech, 2 November 2017| AIWW 2017: Cellvation wins Aquatech Innovation Award for recovery of toilet paper, 1 November 2017 Opening AIWW 2017: Dutch PM calls for better reflection of true values of water, 31 October 2017 AIWW 2017: Meet the Dutch Water Sector More information Amsterdam International Water Week www.internationalwaterweek.com Compilation of the Amsterdam International Water Week Conference 2017 'Water...and nine billion people'. Annette Bos, director Water at RAI Amsterdam wraps up all the highlights of the 2017-edition of Aquatech Amsterdam in an interview with chief editor Tom Freyberg of Water & Wastewater International. Things Ripping Apart to Grow 77% of insects disappeared from Germany nature preserves. University of Sussex UK, Professor David Goulson reports. Then an intriguing look at the world before and after trees with Dr. Chris Berry, University of Cardiff. French Senator Ronan Dantec on the Bonn climate talks and Climate Chance. Radio Ecoshock 171108 Download or listen to this program in CD Quality (57 MB) or Lo-Fi (14 MB) DISAPPEARING INSECTS: DAVID GOULSON We like butterflies because they are pretty and dont bite. The rest of the insects eat our crops, give us diseases, and bite us. They fly in our faces, food, and windshields. If we took a poll, probably most humans would like to have an insect-free world, but be careful what you wish for. A new study shows insect numbers in parts of Europe have crashed just since 1990. The paper is titled More Than 75 Percent Decline Over 27 Years in Total Flying Insect Biomass in Protected Areas. It was published in the journal PLOS, on October 18, 2017. Our guest is Dr. Dave Goulson. He is a Professor Of Biology at the University of Sussex in the UK, and head of the Goulson Lab. He is a co-author of the new study, which has generated some alarm and worrying headlines. From the deep south of England, we welcome Dr. Dave Goulson to Radio Ecoshock. This story is SO alarming! It spread quickly through social media and major newspaper coverage. But dont rush to call this another climate change extinction. Certainly weather disruption can be hard on bugs, but Goulson suggests things like pesticides from nearby agricultural fields in Germany are a factor. We are also paving over so much of nature, or taming it into farming, that we removed insect habitat. When they cross-checked insect decline in these German cases with weather records, it doesnt appear climate change is the main factor, Goulson says. Dr. Goulson is also an expert on bees, so I ask him if the mystery of bee colony collapse has been solved. Again he says pesticides loom large, but we may never know the whole reason behind the die-off of so many of our precious bees. This study only covered flying insects, but it turns out the majority of insects do fly, or at least could fly. The study was only possible because insect-lovers in Germany had the patience to set up traps for flying bugs every year for 30 years, and carefully count what was captured. Its even more disconcerting that such a huge disappearance of flying insects happens in nature preserves, in Germany which tends to be serious about nature preserves. Nowhere is safe. We talk about whether the German loss is reflected in other parts of the world, but the needed studies have not been done. We do know about disappearing bees. People are talking about fewer bugs splatters on their windscreens than in previous years. But we dont know for scientific certain. Is it possible we could be entering a mass extinction of insects and not even realize it? By the way, if insects decline dramatically, there is little chance we can continue feeding billions of humans. Our lives and theirs are intertwined in many ways, whether we are aware of it or not. According to the paper, 80% of wild plants are estimated to depend on insects for pollination, while 60% of birds rely on insects as a food source. Download or listen to this 20 minute Radio Ecoshock interview with David Goulson in CD Quality or Lo-Fi THE FIRST TREES ARRIVE (and change everything) CHRIS BERRY In the last few Radio Ecoshock shows Ive talked with scientists who explain the huge role forests play in either regulating or changing everything from weather to climate. But imagine a world without trees and then their first arrival. A team of scientists have painstakingly analyzed the remnants of ancient trees. Natures first attempt to build tall living towers from carbon was difficult and strange. Trust me, trees changed Earth more than you know. Answers have just been published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The title is Unique growth strategy in the Earths first trees revealed in silicified fossil trunks from China. The lead author is Hong-He Xu from the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Nanjing. Our guide in this program is co-author Dr. Christopher Berry, Senior Lecturer in Palaeobotany at Cardiff University in the UK. Before we get to his latest science which has landed in major newspapers, I step back to a previous stunning article that Chris co-authored. Im talking about the 2015 paper whose title starts out Investigating Devonian trees as geo-engineers of past climates The lead author on that one is Jennifer Morris from Cardiff University. That earlier paper said the mineral changes brought in the soil by tree roots ultimately caused, quote, a 90% decline in atmospheric CO2 levels through the Palaeozoic. With the warming gas CO2 tumbling, did early trees create the conditions for an ice age? But even with such a stunning carbon loss, the ice age did not happen. Chris speculates this may have several reasons, including the way trees added a darker color to the Earth, thus absorbing more sun (albedo change). Personally, I also wonder if the carbon dioxide levels started out so high at that time, that even a great loss left the atmosphere above the levels required for an ice age? Even so, we can see that the arrival of trees was a fundamental change to the operation of the carbon cycle, and the climate of Earth. Paleoclimatologists on Radio Ecoshock say Earth was in a warmer ice-free state for much, much longer than the recurring ice ages humans experience. Is it possible that the arrival of trees, with their larger demands, was part of the destabilization of climate, ever since? Chris has specialized in an ancient type of tree, now extinct, called cladoxylopsids. Their fossil trunks have been found in many places, including near the fossil forest in Gilboa New York State. But the real revelation came from samples found in China. These are not technically fossils because a different process left even the cell structure intact. That allowed the scientists to reconstruct the odd way these first trees developed. I wont get into my philosophical thoughts about whether trees, or all complex lives, are really colonies rather than individuals. I do ask Chris Berry the Gaia hypothesis first presented by James Lovelock. Does life create the conditions on Earth needed for more life? Download or listen to this 27 minute Radio Ecoshock interview with Chris Berry in CD Quality or Lo-Fi You can read more about this new science here at phys.org, and here at Newsweek (with a short video of Chris Berry). BONN CLIMATE TALKS AND FRENCH ACTIVISM: SENATOR RONAN DANTEC In the first weeks of November, world governments will meet in Bonn, Germany to plan our reaction to the climate crisis. Called COP23, it is supposed to flesh out commitments in the Paris Climate Agreement of 2015. The conference is being ignored by North American media. Some citizens have not heard of climate change, a few do not believe it, and far more think the United Nations Climate process is literally too little too late. A new Emissions Gap report from the United Nations Environmental Program agrees. It says even if all the emissions cuts promises made at Paris are kept, which seems unlikely, the world would still warm by 3 degrees C by the end of this century. Scientists have called that level of warming catastrophic. Find the eighth annual United Nations Emissions Gap report here. Obviously, we need pressure from every level of society to do much more. Our next guest has helped draw together organizations of youth, environmental groups, trade unions, Indigenous people, women and business to put pressure on the governments in Bonn. Ronan Dantec is the French Senator for Loire-Atlantique, just re-elected in September. A member of many boards and positions, he serves as Chairman of a French special commission on the effects of global warming. Dantec is a member of the French National Council for Ecological Transition. [(CNTE)] Ronan Dantec is also the spokesman on climate change negotiations for the international organization called United Cities and Local Governments, [(UCLG)]. He is President of the Climate Chance Association, climat chance, an organization of non-state actors calling for concrete action on climate change. Senator Ronan Dantc ABOUT GREEN NANTES Our guest Ronan Dantec has been a representative in the French city of Nantes. There is a lot we can learn from this green city. Nantes is considered a port city, although it is not directly on the Atlantic coast, but up the Loire River. Looking at a map, we might call it in northern France, but the French do not consider it northern. From the Climate Chance web site: European Green Capital in 2013, President of Eurocities, the network of 130 major European metropolitan areas, climate spokesman for the Cites et Gouvenement locaux unis (CGLU) network, Nantes is a recognized city for the ecology and energy transition. Building on the Nantes urban area, this world summit will enable actors to experiment concrete dialog between local civil society and representatives of international civil society. We can also learn a lot from the French effort to organize non-state actors. Surely we cant leave climate negotiations up to world governments, many of which are not democratically elected anyway. Even in Democracies, climate action is lagging far beyond the reality. So we need to organize the rest of us. WHO ARE NON-STATE ACTORS? According to Climate Chance, the entire organized civil society [is] categorised by the United Nations into nine Major Groups: Non-governmental organisations (ENGO) Business and Industry (BINGO) Local Authorities (LGMA) Indigenous peoples (IPO) Research institutes and independent organisations (RINGO) Trade unions (TUNGO) Women and Gender organisations (Women & Gender) Children and Youth organisations (YOUNGO) Farmers organisations (Farmers) This U.N. list leaves out media, even independent media; artists; and notably churches, which are surly part of the entire organised civil society? Still, this is a huge list of players, all of them needing a voice at the Bonn Climate talks and beyond. All of these players were organized in Morocco in September 2017, under an agreement called The Agadir Declaration. You can read it here. By the way, the Bonn talks are supposed to be the technical meetings, prior to later conferences. It would have been less public I suppose, if Donald Trump had not withdrawn from the talks. It appears America is not sending representatives to Bonn. Weve just learned that Syria has joined the Paris Agreement, leaving the United States as the only country in the world not promising to act to avoid dangerous climate disruption. In many parts of Africa, the European language of choice is not English but French. So France can help African states organize climate action. But outside a few oil and gas producers, these are generally low-emission countries who will be highly impacted by climate disruption. What can Africa hope to do in the climate fight? Download or listen to this 13 minute Radio Ecoshock interview with Ronan Dantec in CD Quality Northern Europe was just hit by yet another extreme weather event, this time a battering storm. Caribbean islands have been wiped out, and Houston badly damaged. What happens if populations become so bogged down in each disaster, there is little energy for larger climate solutions? People may already be in despair of any real government action to save us. The process seems so closed and boring. What happens if we ignore the COP meetings and climate summits? We are out of time. As always, I can use a little of your financial support to make this program. Stations do not pay for it, and I dont bother you with advertising. It is listener-supported journalism with a touch of campaigning. Check out your options here. Im Alex Smith. Thank you for listening, and please join us again next week for more Radio Ecoshock. NEW YORK Fashion brand H&M has announced that it has partnered with community non-profit organisation Keep America Beautiful as part of its Garment Collecting initiative. The companies are urging customers to participate in America Recycles Day by donating unwanted textiles from any brand to any H&M store in the United States from 9-15 November. H&M says participants will receive 15 per cent off their next purchase. What Is Climate Change? Is It Different From Global Warming? Climate change is actually not a new phenomenon. Scientists have been studying the connection between human activity and the effect on the climate since the 1800s, although it took until the 1950s to find evidence suggesting a link. Since then, the amount of greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and fluorinated gases) in the atmosphere have steadily increased, taking a sharp jump in the late 1980s when the summer of 1988 became the warmest on record. (There have been many records broken since then.) But climate change is not a synonym for global warming. The term global warming entered the lexicon in the 1950s, but didnt become a common buzzword until a few decades later when more people started taking notice of a warming climate. Except climate change encompasses a greater realm than just rising temperatures. Trapped gases also affect sea-level rise, animal habitats, biodiversity and weather patterns. For example, Texas severe winter storms in February 2021 demonstrate how the climate isnt merely warming. Related: What Are The Top States For Solar Incentives? Why Is Climate Change Important? Why Does It Matter? Marc Guitard / Moment / Getty Images Despite efforts from forward thinkers such as SpaceX Founder Elon Musk to colonize Mars, Earth remains our home for the foreseeable future, and the more human activity negatively impacts the climate, the less habitable it will become. Its estimated that Earth has already warmed about one degree Celsius, or two degrees Fahrenheit, since the start of the Industrial Revolution around the 1750s, although climate change tracking didnt start until the late 1800s. That warming number may not sound like much, but this increase has already resulted in more frequent and severe wildfires, hurricanes, floods, droughts and winter storms, to name some examples. Environmental Impacts Then theres biodiversity loss, another fallout of climate change thats threatening rainforests and coral reefs and accelerating species extinction. Take rainforests, which act as natural carbon sinks by absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. But as rampant deforestation is occurring everywhere from Brazils Amazon to Borneo, fewer trees mean that rainforests are becoming carbon sources, emitting more carbon than theyre absorbing. Meanwhile, coral reefs are dying as warming ocean temperatures trigger bleaching events, which cause corals to reject algae, their main food and life source. Fewer trees, coral reefs and other habitats also equate to fewer species. Known as the sixth mass extinction, a 2019 UN report revealed that up to a million plant and animal species could become extinct within decades. Human Impact It can be easy to overlook climate change in day-to-day life, or even realize that climate change is behind it. Notice theres yet another romaine lettuce recall due to E. Coli? Research suggests that E. Coli bacteria are becoming more common in our food sources as it adapts to climate change. Cant find your favorite brand of coffee beans anymore? Or that the price has doubled? Climate change is affecting that too. Climate change is also worsening air quality and seasonal allergies, along with polluting tap water. Not least, many preliminary studies have also drawn a line between climate change and the deadly COVID-19 pandemic that is still gripping much of the world. Future pandemics are likely to happen more frequently until the root causes, such as deforestation, are addressed. Speaking of larger-scale issues, global water scarcity is already happening more frequently. The Caribbean is facing water shortages due to rising temperatures and decreased rainfall; Australias dams may run dry by 2022 as severe wildfires increase and Cape Town, South Africa has already faced running out of water. As touched upon earlier, its one thing to be inconvenienced by a lack of romaine lettuce for a couple of weeks or higher coffee bean prices, but reports warn how climate change will continue to threaten global food security, to the point of triggering a worldwide food crisis if temperatures surpass two degrees Celsius. Many of these factors are already contributing to climate migration, forcing large numbers of people to relocate to other parts of the world in search of better living conditions. Unless more immediate, drastic action is taken to combat climate change, future generations will have to contend with worst-case scenario projections by the end of the 21st century, not limited to coastal cities going underwater, including Miami; lethal heat levels from South Asia to Central Africa; and more frequent extreme weather events involving hurricanes, wildfires, tsunamis, droughts, floods, blizzards and more. Related: What Are The Best Solar Companies? Whats Happening and Why? Fiddlers Ferry power station in Warrington, UK. Chris Conway / Moment / Getty Images The Earths temperature has largely remained stable until industrial times and the introduction of greenhouse gases. These gases have forced the atmosphere to retain heat, as evidenced by rising global temperatures. As the planet grows warmer, glaciers melt faster, sea levels rise, severe flooding increases and droughts and extreme weather events become more deadly. The Greenhouse Effect In the late 1800s, Swedish chemist Svante Arrhenius studied the connection between the amount of atmospheric carbon and its ability to warm and cool the Earth, and while his initial calculations suggested extreme warming as carbon increased, researchers didnt start to take human-induced climate change seriously until the late 20th century. But proof of human-led climate change can be traced to the 1850s, and satellites are among the ways that scientists have been tracking increased greenhouse gases and their climate impact in more recent years. Climate researchers have also documented warmer oceans, ocean acidification, shrinking ice sheets, decreased snow amounts and extreme weather as among the events resulting from greenhouse gases heating the planet. Numerous factors contribute to the production of greenhouse gases, known as the greenhouse effect. One of the biggest causes involve burning fossil fuels, including coal, oil and natural gas, to power everything from cars to daily energy needs (electricity, heat). From 1970-2011, fossil fuels have comprised 78 percent of total greenhouse gas emissions. Big Ag is another greenhouse contributor, particularly beef production, with the industry adding 10 percent in 2019. This is attributed to clearing land for crops and grazing and growing feed, along with methane produced by cows themselves. In the U.S. alone, Americans consumed 27.3 billion pounds of beef in 2019. Then theres rampant deforestation occurring everywhere from the Amazon to Borneo. A 2021 study from Rainforest Foundation Norway found that two-thirds of the worlds rainforests have already been destroyed or degraded. In Brazil, deforestation reached a 12-year-high in 2020 under right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro. As it stands, reports predict that the Amazon rainforest will collapse by 2064. Rainforests are important carbon sinks, meaning the trees capture and remove carbon from the atmosphere. As rainforests collapse, the remaining trees will begin emitting more greenhouse gases than theyre absorbing. Meanwhile, a recent study revealed that abandoned oil and gas wells are leaking more methane than previously believed, with U.S. wells contributing up to 20 percent of annual methane emissions. Not least is the cement industry. Cement is heavily used throughout the global construction industry, and accounts for around eight percent of carbon dioxide emissions. Natural Climate Change Granted, natural climate change exists as well, and can be traced throughout history, from solar radiation triggering the Ice Ages to the asteroid strike that rapidly raised global temperatures and eliminated dinosaurs and many other species in the process. Other sources of natural climate change impacts include volcano eruptions, ocean currents and orbital changes, but these sources generally have smaller and shorter-term environmental impacts. How We Can Combat Climate Change Participant holding a sign at the climate march on Sept. 20, 2020, in Manhattan. A coalition of climate, Indigenous and racial justice groups gathered at Columbus Circle to kick off Climate Week with the Climate Justice Through Racial Justice march. Erik McGregor / LightRocket / Getty Images While the latest studies and numbers can often feel discouraging about societys ability to prevent the worst-case climate scenarios from happening, theres still time to take action. As a Society In 2015 at COP 21 in Paris, 197 countries came together to sign the Paris Agreement, an international climate change treaty agreeing to limit global warming in this century to two degrees Celsius, and ideally 1.5 degrees Celsius, compared to pre-industrial levels; its believed that the planet has warmed one degree Celsius since 1750. Studies show that staying within the two-degree range will prevent the worst-case climate scenarios from happening. Achieving this goal requires participating parties to drastically slash greenhouse gas emissions sooner rather than later. However, there have already been numerous setbacks since then, from former U.S. President Donald Trump withdrawing from the Paris Agreement in 2020 to world leaders, such as China, the worlds biggest polluter, failing to enact aggressive climate action plans. Yet many of the treaty participants have been slow to implement changes, putting the world on track to hit 3.2 degrees Celsius by the end of the 21st century even if the initial goals are met. However, its worth noting that U.S. President Joe Biden rejoined the Paris Agreement in 2021, and pledged to cut greenhouse gases in half by 2030. Then theres the Montreal Protocol, a 1987 global agreement to phase out ozone-depleting substances such as chlorofluorocarbons, chemicals that were commonly used in air-conditioning, refrigeration and aerosols. Recent studies show that parts of the ozone are recovering, proving that a unified commitment to combatting climate change issues does make a difference. On a smaller scale, carbon offset initiatives allow companies and individuals to invest in environmental programs that offset the amount of carbon thats produced through work or lifestyle. For example, major companies (and carbon emitters) such as United Airlines and Shell have pledged to achieve net-zero carbon emissions in part by participating in carbon offset programs that remove carbon from the atmosphere. The problem is that these companies are still producing high levels of fossil fuel emissions. While individuals can make a small impact through carbon offsets, the greater responsibility lies with carbon-emitting corporations to find and implement greener energy alternatives. This translates to car companies producing electric instead of gas vehicles or airlines exploring alternative fuel sources. It also requires major companies to rely more on solar and wind energy for their energy needs. In Our Own Lives While its up to corporations to do the heavy lifting of carbon reduction, that doesnt mean individuals cant make a difference. Adopting a vegan lifestyle, using public transportation, switching to an electric car and becoming a more conscious consumer are all ways to help combat climate change. Veganism Consuming meat relies on clearing land for crops and animals, while raising and killing livestock contributes to about 14.5% of global greenhouse gas emissions, according to the UNs Food and Agricultural Organization. By comparison, choosing a plant-based diet could reduce greenhouse gas footprints by as much as 70 percent, especially when choosing local produce and products. Public Transportation Riding public trains, subways, buses, trams, ferries and other types of public transportation is another easy way to lower your carbon footprint, considering that gas-powered vehicles contribute 95 percent of transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions. Electric Vehicles Electric cars and trucks have come down in price as more manufacturers enter the field, and these produce far lower emissions than their gas counterparts. Hybrid vehicles are another good alternative for lowering individual emission contributions. Conscious Consumption Buying locally produced food and items is another way to maintain a lower carbon footprint, as the products arent shipped or driven long distances. Supporting small companies that are committed to sustainability is another option, especially when it comes to clothes. Fast fashion has become a popular option thanks to its price point, but often comes at the expense of the environment and can involve unethical overseas labor practices. Not least, plastic saturates every corner of the consumer market, but its possible to find non-plastic alternatives with a little research, from reusable produce bags to baby bottles. Climate Activism Those interested in becoming even more involved can join local climate action organizations. Popular groups include the Sunrise Movement, Fridays for Future, Greenpeace and the Sierra Club, to name a few. Voting, volunteering, calling local representatives and participating in climate marches are additional ways to raise your voice. Takeaway Its taken centuries to reach a climate tipping point, with just a matter of decades left to prevent the worst-case climate scenarios from happening. But theres still hope of controlling a warming climate as long as individuals, companies and nations make an immediate concerted effort to lower greenhouse gas emissions. As the world already experienced with the COVID-19 pandemic, a rapid unified response can make all the difference. Meredith Rosenberg is a senior editor at EcoWatch. She holds a Masters from the Newmark Graduate School of Journalism in NYC and a B.A. from Temple University in Philadelphia. Kentucky-based biotechnology startup MosquitoMate was given U.S. government approval to release bacteria-infected mosquitoes in several states. The companys lab-grown Aedes albopictus (aka ZAP males) are designed to halt the spread of mosquito-borne diseases. So how does it work? When ZAP males mate with wild female Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, which can carry yellow fever, dengue and Zika, the resulting eggs do not hatch. Thats because MosquitoMates bugs are infected with Wolbachia, a common and naturally occurring strain of bacterium that Aedes aegypti does not carry. The fertilized eggs never hatch because the paternal chromosomes do not properly form, according to Nature. Mosquitoes infected with Wolbachia are also less likely to carry viruses. The hope is that wild, disease-carrying mosquito populations will eventually die out. And since the ZAP males do not bite, these mozzies shouldnt be a problem to have around. Its a non-chemical way of dealing with mosquitoes, so from that perspective, youd think it would have a lot of appeal, David OBrochta, an entomologist at the University of Maryland in Rockville, told Nature. Im glad to see it pushed forward, as I think it could be potentially really important. Gizmodo reported that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Nov. 3 registered the lab-grown mosquito as a biopesticide. MosquitoMate will have a five-year license to sell in 20 different states and Washington, DC. We are excited to announce EPA approval, please read all about it and thanks to @NatureNews for the great announcement! https://t.co/sIchal7qFM MosquitoMate (@MosquitoMate) November 6, 2017 First were going to prove our business model here in Lexington, Kentucky, but we have approval in 20 states, Karen Dobson, MosquitoMate production manager, told Motherboard. The company will have to produce millions of its mosquitoes in order to suppress an entire citys mosquito population, Nature reported. MosquitoMate must find a way to efficiently separate its non-biting male mosquitoes from females, a process thats currently done by hand and mechanically. This is not the first time the U.S. government has approved the release of lab-reared mosquitoes to combat diseases. Last year, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration cleared the experimental release of genetically modified mosquitoes in the Florida Keys to help combat the Zika virus. But as Motherboard noted, local voters rejected the plan over concerns about its impacts on the local environment. By Phineas Rueckert Last year, scientist Stephen Hawking gave humans a shelf-life of 1,000 more years on Earth. Apparently, 2017 hasnt been to his likingas Hawking shaved another 400 years off that prediction. The world-renowned scientist said Tuesday that he believes humans will only last another 600 years before Earth becomes a sizzling ball of fire that marks the end of humanity, The Sun reported. Hawkings comments came as part of the Tencent WE Summit in Beijing. The scientist, who suffers from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and speaks with a speech-generating device, dialed into the conference with a video call urging humans to instead look toward colonizing a neighboring star system called Alpha Centauri, according to Metro UK. So, how does he want humans do this? Hawking believes something called the Breakthrough Starshot project may offer a way to find life beyond Earth. The project aims to reach the nearest star system to our own, Alpha Centauri, where last August scientists discovered a potentially habitable Earth-like planet, by sending out ultralight nanobeams that would reach Alpha Centauri in a couple of decades. Such a system could reach Mars in less than an hour, or reach Pluto in days, pass Voyager in under a week and reach Alpha Centauri in just over 20 years, Hawking said Tuesday. Maybe if all goes well, sometime a little after the middle of the century, well have our first picture of another planet that may be life-bearing orbiting the nearest star, he added. As for this planet, Hawking was not so hopeful. Hawking warned that soaring population sizes and increasing demands for energy would lead to Earths eventual demise, according to the Daily Mail. The relationship between population growth and climate change is clear. Rapidly industrializing countries like India and China are expected to contribute half of all CO2 emissions by 2050, according to the United Nations Population Fund. Global Citizen advocates for countries to adopt the Global Goals for Sustainable Development, including goal number 13: climate action. You can take action here. If we cannot stabilize climate and we cannot stabilize population, there is not an ecosystem on Earth that we can save, the nonprofit Worldwatch Institute told Scientific American. Hawking has been critical of U.S. climate change policy under President Donald Trump. The U.S. will soon be the only country to not sign the Paris agreement, which aims to put a cap on global temperature rise at 1.5 degrees Celsius. U.S. Now the Only Country Not in Paris Climate Agreement https://t.co/XBYj1lZu7x @ecowatch #COP23 Sierra Club (@SierraClub) November 7, 2017 Trumps action could push the earth over the brink, to become like Venus, with a temperature of two hundred and fifty degrees, and raining sulphuric acid, Hawking said in an interview with BBC this past July. Reposted with permission from our media associate Global Citizen. An aging oil pipeline moves 23 million gallons of oil and natural gas liquids per day along the bottomlands of the Straits of Mackinac, where Lake Michigan and Lake Huron crash into each other in the heart of the Great Lakes. This pipelineLine 5, built in 1953is operated by the same company responsible for one of the largest inland oil spills in North American history: Enbridge. During that pipeline rupture, previously known cracks formed into a 6 foot gash which spilled more than 840,000 gallons of oil into the Kalamazoo River in 2010. Endangered piping plovers nest along the Great Lakes shorelines which would be impacted by a Line 5 oil spill. Vince Cavalieri / USFWS Whats Wrong with the Pipeline? There are numerous places along the underwater section of the pipeline where protective coating is missing, and for much of the history of the pipeline, sections of pipe were not properly supported on the Lake Michigan lakebedwhere it gets pummeled by oscillating currents. In fact, those supports were not replaced until video from a National Wildlife Federation dive inspection revealed they were lacking. Recently, Enbridge itself confirmed that part of its outer protection coating was missing from sections of the pipeline, and revealed in October 2017 that it has known about missing sections of coating since 2014 but failed to report the easement violation to state officials. An April 2017 National Wildlife Federation report revealed that the land-based sections of Line 5 have leaked at least 29 times since 1968, spilling more than 1 million gallons of oil. We cannot risk a spill in the Straits, which a 2016 University of Michigan study estimates could put up to 700 miles of shoreline at risk depending on current and weather conditions, with up to 150 miles impacted in any one spill, risking a 17,000-square mile spill zone. Additionally, the pipeline has been operating without an adequate spill response plan, as required by the Clean Water Act. Due to this, the National Wildlife Federation sued the U.S. Department of Transportation and the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration in January 2017, challenging this illegal operation of the pipeline. The Old, Hidden Pipeline at the Bottom of the Great Lakes https://t.co/BSFIAmiYic @waterkeeper @FreshWaterCLE EcoWatch (@EcoWatch) October 13, 2017 Whats at Stake? At risk are the fish and wildlife of the Great Lakes, the drinking water relied upon by citizens, and the regions recreation and tourism economy which supports the northern Michigan way of life. So it should be no surprise that two-thirds of Michiganders oppose the continued operation of the pipeline under the Straits, as reported by a 2016 EPIC-MRA poll commissioned by the National Wildlife Federation. Of particular note is the threat to the endangered piping plover shorebird. Piping plovers nest in the summer along the sandy beaches of the Great Lakes, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has designated critical habitat for piping plovers which falls within the spill zone risk identified by the University of Michigan. Whats Being Done About It? The State of Michigan released a report on alternatives to Line 5 on June 29, while the week before it scrapped a risk analysis due to a conflict of interest arising from an employee of the firm hired to do the analysis also working on a separate project for Enbridge. In September, Michigans Pipeline Safety Advisory Board authorized a panel of academic experts from Michigans universities, led by Dr. Guy Meadows of Michigan Technological University, to resume the risk analysis. This is a positive step in getting the state the actionable information it needs to decommission Line 5, said Mike Shriberg, executive director of the National Wildlife Federations Great Lakes Regional Center, and a member of the Pipeline Safety Advisory Board when the academic study was approved. Engaging top academic minds will ensure that Michigans residents and resources will be prioritized. Demand Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder act to keep the Great Lakes safe! Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg are backing it with hundreds of millions of dollars. States from Florida to Vermont have adopted supportive laws and policies. And school districts across the country are embracing this emerging education trend. But as personalized learning takes root, its also coming under greater scrutiny. Leading researchers say their work does not support the most enthusiastic claims being made by personalized-learning supporters. Education experts are raising questions about implications for teaching and learning. Tech-industry critics are sounding alarms about Silicon Valleys growing influence over public schools. And a small but vocal coalition of parents and activists from across the political spectrum deride the term personalized learning as an Orwellian misnomer for replacing teachers with digital devices and data-mining software. Such resistance is probably not surprising. When any new educational strategy receives money and attention, questions arise. Like other efforts to improve U.S. schools, personalized learning is getting swept up in decades-long disagreements over how children learn, the proper role of teachers, and who gets to decide how public education is organized. But personalized learning also faces some unique challenges. The biggest is lack of clarity around what the term actually means. In general, personalized-learning models seek to adapt the pace of learning and the instructional strategies being used to best fit each individual childs strengths, weaknesses, and interests. In the digital age, realizing these goals is often seen as dependent on technologyto help measure in real-time what each student knows; to develop learner profiles"; and to help match each child with customized learning experiences and playlists. In practice, though, personalized learning is used to describe everything from supplemental software programs to whole-school redesigns. As a result, the term has become a blank slate on to which supporters and skeptics alike project their own hopes, fears, and beliefs. To help K-12 educators and policymakers consider personalized learning from every angle, Education Week is taking a close look at the perspectives of critics like Tiffany Dunn, a veteran teacher in Kentuckys 101,000-student Jefferson County school system whose strongly held concerns broadly reflect the worries of other opponents. This whole thing is coming from the tech industry, which doesnt understand that what kids need is someone to love them and get excited about them, Dunn said. Im not aware of any research that says sticking a child in front of a computer for hours on end does them any good. Do such arguments hold weight? How do proponents respond? What do third-party experts say? What follows is a breakdown of the three main critiques leveled against personalized learning. Argument#1: The Hype Outweighs the Research No one has studied personalized learning more closely than the RAND Corporation. And RAND is unambiguous about what its research shows . The evidence base is very weak at this point, said John F. Pane, a senior scientist and the groups distinguished chair in education innovation. Still, the hype around personalized learning has continued to grow. Take, for example, Facebooks Mark Zuckerberg. Along with his wife, pediatrician Priscilla Chan, the founder of the giant social-networking company plans to use his Chan Zuckerberg Initiative to invest billions of dollars into personalized-learning efforts. Zuckerberg regularly articulates his goal of personalizing education for every student. Such lofty ambition is common throughout the ed-tech industry. Dozens of companies now tout a wide range of software, platforms, and apps as transformative tools for personalizing student learning. Schools are buying in: 97 percent of district leaders surveyed by the Education Week Research Center last year indicated that their districts had invested in some form of personalized learning. Proponents say it would be a mistake to dismiss all those efforts as misguided, or not based on any evidence at all. For one thing, RAND has found early signs that some comprehensive, whole-school personalized learning models yield modest student achievement gains. And at its heart, said Richard Culatta, the CEO of the International Society for Technology in Education, personalized learning is about giving students control over their own learning; differentiating instruction for each child; and providing real-time feedback. Plenty of research supports each of those strategies. Whats new about contemporary versions of personalized learning, Culatta maintained, is the use of technology to bring those individual approaches together into a coherent whole. Whats happening now should be understood as research-and-development, with many experiments taking place at once, Culatta said. How can K-12 educators and policymakers make sense of such a confusing, evolving landscape? Louis Gomez has some ideas. An education professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, Gomez studies the ways technology initiatives play out inside school systems. The reality, he said, is that many schools purchase off-the-shelf software and call it personalized learning, without being able to say what is supposed to change in the classroom. And even when schools do take a broader view, they often fail to recognize that success depends largely on decisions that educators and administrators make on the ground. Thats in part because many versions of personalized learning seek to change or replace fundamental processes that shape the day-to-day life of schoolseverything from how teachers prepare lessons to how students are graded. Inevitably, Gomez said, that causes tension. RANDs research, for example, has consistently found that even in the best-supported personalized-learning schools, teachers frequently say theres not enough time to truly tailor the learning experience to each child. Does that mean that schools should ditch the personalized-learning experiments? No, Gomez, Culatta, and the RAND researchers agree. Theres real reason to be excited. But its OK to wait for more and better evidence, they said. If you do plunge in, be sure the initial stakes for failure are low, and build in opportunities to learn. I would not advise schools to dump massive resources into going fully into personalized learning, said Laura S. Hamilton, the associate director of RAND Education. Experiment with some new approaches that might be a good fit for your particular school or district, but monitor it very closely. Argument #2: Personalized Learning is Bad for Teachers and Students Every student is a unique combination of individual skills, abilities, and preferences, writes Todd Rose in The End of Average , which has become a kind of bible for the personalized-learning movement. Therefore, trying to peg each childs learning experiences to some notion of what is typical for most children is both misguided and harmful. Instead, many personalized-learning proponents suggest, schools should leverage technology to expand the benefits of good one-to-one human tutoring. By pursuing that vision, personalized learning can help children develop the skills, purpose, and passion to not only learn content and skills, but to think critically and build relationships, said Diane Tavenner, the CEO of Californias Summit Public Schools charter network. Heres what I consistently hear, said Tavenner, describing her interactions with the thousands of educators across the country receiving training on Summits technology platform and instructional model (which were developed with support from Facebook and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative.) They say, This lets me be the teacher Ive always wanted to be. But many experts, from across the political and pedagogical spectrum, arent sure they buy it. The sharpest critiques have come from progressives like Alfie Kohn, the author of Schooling Beyond Measure. Its behaviorism on a screen, Kohn said of personalized learning. Heres what he means: First, many critics believe that personalized learning boils down to kids working alone on software, an approach they say ignores the crucial social aspects of learning and reduces teachers to the role of facilitators. Because so many different approaches get labeled as personalized learning, its hard to say how often that really happens. In the schools RAND is studying, the researchers describe such practices as relatively rare. But in August, the Silicon Schools Fund, which provides millions of dollars to leading personalized-learning networks, released a report describing lessons learned during five years supporting the field. Among the concerns were schools that were often very quiet, because students were head-down, working on their computers at their exact level. Now, the fund says, most of the groups it supports are trying to reduce the time students spend alone on computers to 20 to 40 percent of the school day. On a deeper level, Kohn and some other progressive educators believe that real learning happens when students are driven by their intrinsic curiosity to pursue answers to their own questions about the world. By contrast, Kohn said, much of whats marketed as personalized learning amounts to little more than breaking knowledge and ideas down into itty-bitty parts, then using extrinsic rewards to march kids through a series of decontextualized skills they had no meaningful role in choosing. Some conservative education-policy experts raise similar concerns. Michael Petrilli, for example, is the head of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute. Like Kohn, he worries that some versions of personalized learning encourage a reductionist type of education that breaks learning into little bits and scraps and bytes of disparate skills, disconnected from an inspiring, coherent whole. That tendency is particularly troublesome in the early grades and in subjects other than math, he said. But while Kohn worries that personalized learning doesnt give students enough control over their learning, Petrilli fears the opposite. Its already hard enough to ensure that all students are held to challenging standards and offered rigorous curriculum, he said. Personalized learnings emphasis on offering different content and paths to each student could open the door for watered-down expectations, greater inequities, and more difficulty holding schools accountable. Tavenner, of Summit Public Schools, described both critiques as legitimate"but only in those cases where personalized learning is solely about helping students efficiently master discrete information and skills. Thats not the case at Summit, Tavenner maintained. She said the strongest personalized-learning models offer the best of what both conservatives and progressives want: high-quality standards and content for students, with opportunities to apply that knowledge via self-directed projects, all supplemented by human mentors and technology tools that help students keep track of their own learning. Do such claims hold up to outside scrutiny? Theres not yet any definitive answer. But Stanford University professor Larry Cuban, a long-time ed-tech skeptic, recently spent a year observing classrooms at Summit and other personalized-learning schools in Silicon Valley. Cuban said he was surprised to find meaningful, incremental improvements in how teachers organize and teach a lesson"but not the kind of revolutionary new model of education that Tavenner describes. Overall, the personalized-learning field is still marked by significant unresolved pedagogical tensions, said Benjamin Riley, the executive director of the nonprofit Deans for Impact, which seeks to improve teacher preparation. Among the biggest: the appropriate role for software in the classroom, how much autonomy is best for student learning, and the challenge of maintaining high standards and social interaction when every student is pursuing his or her own path. Too often, Riley said, proponents gloss over such concerns. There are tradeoffs here, and we at least need to acknowledge them, he said. Argument #3: Big Tech + Big Data = Big Problems Finally, many critics are worried that personalized learning is cover for an aggressive push by the tech industry to turn K-12 education into a giant data-mining enterprise. For parents and activists like Karen Effrem, that belief provokes intense fear and anger. Were sacrificing our childrens privacy, and were allowing corporations to make potentially life-changing decisions about our kids, all for technology that doesnt actually help them, said Effrem, the president of Education Liberty Watch, an advocacy organization that supports parents right to control their childrens education. Evaluating such critiques can be difficult. The proprietary technical engines that drive the personalized-learning movement are largely black boxes, inaccessible to public inspection. What is clear, though, is student data are the fuel that makes many of those systems go. Just listen to Bharat Mediratta, a former Google engineer who helped launch personalized-learning pioneer AltSchool, which aims to harvest information about students via everything from classroom cameras to computer keystrokes. First, we need to generate the big data, Mediratta told Education Week last year . Then, we start figuring out how to use it to transform education. Writ large, that philosophy has prompted worry about the sheer volume of information collected from children in school, especially amid the recent push to better understand students behaviors, feelings, and mindsets. Security and privacy are also front-of-mind: Just this spring, for example, popular digital-learning platform Edmodo was hacked , resulting in the personal information of an estimated 77 million users being put up for sale on an unregulated part of the internet. And many critics worry that algorithms are increasingly being used to make key decisions shaping childrens futures, without any real way for students and parents to understand how those choices are made, or challenge them for possible errors or biases. Personalized-learning proponents generally acknowledge such fears as legitimate, suggesting they can be solved through dialogue and better regulation. As we in the tech world get closer to having a better picture of each student at any given point in time, all of these discussions about data and privacy need to continue, said Kristen DiCerbo, the vice president of education research at global publishing giant Pearson. Its not too late. But some critics say that stance presumes that more data-driven personalization in education is both desirable and inevitable, so long as the wrinkles can be ironed out. K-12 educators and policymakers should question the forces driving that narrative, said Audrey Watters, an independent researcher who maintains the popular Hack Education blog. The push for more personalized learning isnt happening in a vacuum, Watters maintained. The movement is emerging from the values and technologies that already define Silicon Valley. And its clear how the companies behind those systems operate. When Facebook promises personalization, Watters said, its really about massive data collection. In the consumer sector, critics say, the downsides of that approach are only now becoming evident, after the technologies have already been deployed at enormous scale. Facebook, for example, has recently come under fire for its role in creating filter bubbles , in which users only see information determined by algorithms to fit with their existing preferences. Critics also decry the ways the company has reportedly sought to identify and manipulate users emotions, including a report last May that it had told some advertisers it could identify when teenagers feel insecure and worthless. And Facebook is one of several tech giants currently in hot water over the way its platform was apparently misused in the run-up to the recent presidential election. Mounting evidence suggests foreign actors targeted unwitting Americans with personalized ads and misinformation designed to influence their voting behaviora problem made possible by the extensive data that Facebook collects from users, and by the lack of public visibility into the customized information that each user receives. In late September, Zuckerberg, the companys CEO, apologized for the ways my work was used to divide people rather than bring us together. Is it crazy to worry there could be similar unintended, unanticipated outcomes if personalized learning systems spread rapidly throughout K-12? There are key differences between the consumer side of Silicon Valley and the work happening in education, according to Jim Shelton, the president of the Chan Zuckerberg Initiatives education division. Most groups trying to bring personalized-learning technologies to public schools arent seeking exponential annual growth, Shelton said. While CZI has given millions of dollars to AltSchool and its big-data-driven approach, the initiative is also supporting models like Summit, which says it avoids algorithmic recommendations and targeting in its platform. And as leaders like Zuckerberg bring their technologies, skills, and experiences into the K-12 arena, Shelton said, they face the burden of demonstrating that the products and approaches they support actually help children learn and grow. Facebook and CZI may be related, but they are not the same, Shelton said. Being deliberate, being humble, and taking a posture of learning are all ways were trying to be responsible as we do this work. Still, educators and the public would be foolish to not carefully consider the tech sectors influence in public schools, especially given its recent stumbles, said Ben Williamson, a lecturer at the University of Stirling in the United Kingdom who studies big data in education. Billions of public dollars are at stake, he said. So are big questions about the fundamental nature of schooling: How do we believe children learn? Who should decide what students need to know and get to experience? How will we determine what theyve learned? We need to open up a bigger debate about whether we really want Silicon Valley establishing this new model of data-driven schooling, Williamson said. These are people whose vision for reforming public education puts their own industry in charge. Some vendors take longer than others to update for critical vulnerabilities case in point is Googles Android mobile operating system. On Nov. 6, Google released an Android update, patching a vulnerability that IT vendors have known about for months. On Oct. 16, security researcher Mathy Vanhoef, working at Belgian University KU Leuven, publicly disclosed the KRACK Wi-Fi vulnerability that affected all Wi-Fi devices that use WPA2 encryption, including every Android device ever built. KRACK is an acronym for Key Reinstallation Attacks and is attack that is able to replay and reuse in-use encryption keys in order to give an attacker unauthorized access. Vanhoef worked with CERT/CC to responsibly disclose the issue and provide vendors with time to patch. The initial private disclosure was sent out to impacted vendors, including Google, on Aug. 28. Multiple vendors, including Microsoft, Aruba, Cisco, Red Hat, Juniper Networks, ZyXEL and Intel, had KRACK patches available on Oct. 16. Apple was a laggard to the KRACK patch, releasing an update on Oct. 31, though Apple was still able to release a patch a week before Google. Googles November Android update finally includes multiple patches for KRACK, though they are not specifically identified as KRACK patches by Google. Rather Google has included the KRACK updates under the System category of the Android November security updates. The most severe vulnerability in this section could enable a proximate attacker to bypass user interaction requirements before joining an unsecured Wi-Fi network, Googles advisory warns. In total Google is patching nine different vulnerabilities that are KRACK related including: CVE-2017-13077, CVE-2017-13078, CVE-2017-13079, CVE-2017-13080, CVE-2017-13081, CVE-2017-13082, CVE-2017-13086, CVE-2017-13087 and CVE-2017-13088. Google has simply labelled the vulnerabilities has being EoP (elevation of privilege) with high severity. The weaknesses are in the Wi-Fi standard itself, and not in individual products or implementations, Vanhoef wrote in his original KRACK advisory. Therefore, any correct implementation of WPA2 is likely affected.? Media Framework In addition to the KRACK patches, Google is once again patching for multiple flaws in Androids much-maligned media framework library. In the November update, there are seven different media framework related issues being patched, five of which are rated as critical and the remaining two as high severity. The most severe vulnerability in this section could enable a remote attacker using a specially crafted file to execute arbitrary code within the context of a privileged process, Google warned in its advisory. Sean Michael Kerner is a senior editor at eSecurityPlanet and InternetNews.com. Follow him on Twitter @TechJournalist. The 2016 mass bleaching event is the most severe global bleaching event to ever be recorded. New research records the impact of this event to the rugged reefs of Western Australia. Researchers from The University of Western Australia (UWA), ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, and Western Australian Marine Science Institution have examined the impact of the 2016 mass bleaching event on reefs in Western Australia (WA). They found significant bleaching occurred in the inshore Kimberley region, despite Kimberley corals being known as exceptionally stress resistant. They also found mild bleaching at Rottnest Island and that the Ningaloo Reef escaped bleaching. The 2016 mass bleaching event is the most severe global bleaching event to ever be recorded. Coral bleaching occurs as the result of abnormal environmental conditions, such as heightened sea temperatures that cause corals to expel tiny photosynthetic algae, called 'zooxanthellae.' The loss of these colourful algae causes the corals to turn white, and 'bleach'. Bleached corals can recover if the temperature drops and zooxanthellae are able to recolonise the coral, otherwise the coral may die. The researchers, led by UWA's Dr Verena Schoepf and Masters student Morane Le Nohaic, conducted surveys on the health of coral reefs along the Western Australian coastline from tropical to temperate locations. "We found a concerning 57 to 80 per cent of corals on inshore Kimberley reefs were bleached in April 2016 - this included Montgomery Reef, Australia's largest inshore reef," Dr Schoepf said. "Our research also found that there was mild bleaching at Rottnest Island - 29 per cent of corals were moderately bleached." "Ningaloo Reef, a UNESCO World Heritage site, escaped bleaching, but had some temperature-unrelated coral mortality. Temperate corals at Bremer Bay (Southwest) experienced no bleaching." Dr Schoepf said bleaching patterns were consistent with patterns of heat stress across WA. "This is the first documented regional-scale bleaching event in WA during an El Nino year and the first time we have been able to measure the percentage of impacted corals in 2016," she said. "Coral reefs in WA are now at risk of bleaching during both El Nino years, such as in 2016, and La Nina years, such as 2010/11. But the geographic footprint differs - the northwest is at risk during El Nino years, whereas Ningaloo Reef and reefs further south are at risk during the La Nina cycle." "As bleaching events become more common in the future, it is critical to monitor how bleaching events impact coral reef resilience, and how long it takes reefs to recover from such catastrophic events." ### The research will be published in the journal Scientific Reports (when embargo lifts). It has been established that sleep deprivation slows down our reaction time, but it has been unclear exactly how the lack of sleep affects brain activity and subsequent behavior. A new Tel Aviv University study published in Nature Medicine finds that individual neurons themselves slow down when we are sleep deprived, leading to delayed behavioral responses to events taking place around us. The neural lapse, or slowdown, affects the brain's visual perception and memory associations. The study was an international collaboration led by Dr. Yuval Nir of TAU's Sackler Faculty of Medicine and Sagol School of Neuroscience; Prof. Itzhak Fried of UCLA, TAU and Tel Aviv Medical Center; and sleep experts Profs. Chiara Cirelli and Giulio Tononi at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. "When a cat jumps into the path of our car at night, the very process of seeing the cat slows us down. We're therefore slow to hit the brakes, even when we're wide awake," says Dr. Nir. "When we're sleep-deprived, a local intrusion of sleep-like waves disrupts normal brain activity while we're performing tasks." Investigators recorded the brain activity of 12 epilepsy patients who had previously shown no or little response to drug interventions at UCLA. The patients were hospitalized for a week and implanted with electrodes to pinpoint the place in the brain where their seizures originated. During their hospitalization, their neuron activity was continuously recorded. After being kept awake all night to accelerate their medical diagnosis, the patients were presented with images of famous people and places, which they were asked to identify as quickly as possible. "Performing this task is difficult when we're tired and especially after pulling an all-nighter," says Dr. Nir. "The data gleaned from the experiment afforded us a unique glimpse into the inner workings of the human brain. It revealed that sleepiness slows down the responses of individual neurons, leading to behavioral lapses." In over 30 image experiments, the research team recorded the electrical activity of nearly 1,500 neurons, 150 of which clearly responded to the images. The scientists examined how the responses of individual neurons in the temporal lobe -- the region associated with visual perception and memory -- changed when sleep-deprived subjects were slow to respond to a task. "During such behavioral lapses, the neurons gave way to neuronal lapses -- slow, weak and sluggish responses," says Prof. Fried. "These lapses were occurring when the patients were staring at the images before them, and while neurons in other regions of the brain were functioning as usual." Investigators then examined the dominant brain rhythms in the same circuits by studying the local electrical fields measured during lapses. "We found that neuronal lapses co-occurred with slow brain waves in the same regions," Dr. Nir says. "As the pressure for sleep mounted, specific regions 'caught some sleep' locally. Most of the brain was up and running, but temporal lobe neurons happened to be in slumber, and lapses subsequently followed. "Since drowsy driving can be as dangerous as drunk driving, we hope to one day translate these results into a practical way of measuring drowsiness in tired individuals before they pose a threat to anyone or anything," Dr. Nir concludes. ### The paper's other co-authors were Thomas Andrillon of the Ecole Normale Superieure in Paris, Amit Marmelshtein of Tel Aviv University, and Nanthia Suthana of UCLA. American Friends of Tel Aviv University (AFTAU) supports Israel's most influential, comprehensive and sought-after center of higher learning, Tel Aviv University (TAU). TAU is recognized and celebrated internationally for creating an innovative, entrepreneurial culture on campus that generates inventions, startups and economic development in Israel. For three years in a row, TAU ranked 9th in the world, and first in Israel, for alumni going on to become successful entrepreneurs backed by significant venture capital, a ranking that surpassed several Ivy League universities. To date, 2,400 patents have been filed out of the University, making TAU 29th in the world for patents among academic institutions. WASHINGTON D.C. -- A new study finds human-caused global warming is significantly increasing the rate at which hot temperature records are being broken around the world. Global annual temperature records show there were 17 record hot years from 1861 to 2005. The new study examines whether these temperature records are being broken more often and if so, whether human-caused global warming is to blame. The results show human influence has greatly increased the likelihood of record-breaking hot years occurring on a global scale. Without human-caused climate change, there should only have been an average of seven record hot years from 1861 to 2005, not 17. Further, human-caused climate change at least doubled the odds of having a record-breaking hot year from 1926 to 1945 and from 1967 onwards, according to the new study. The study also projects that if greenhouse gas emissions remain high, the chance of seeing new global temperature records will continue to increase. By 2100, every other year will be a record breaker, on average, according to the new study accepted for publication in Earth's Future, a journal of the American Geophysical Union. The new findings show how climate change is visibly influencing Earth's temperature, said Andrew King, a climate extremes research fellow at the University of Melbourne in Australia and lead author of the new study. "We can now specifically say climate change is increasing the chance of observing a new temperature record each year," he said. "It's important to point out we shouldn't be seeing these records if human activity weren't contributing to global warming." The study strengthens the link between human activity and recent temperature trends, according to Michael Mann, a climatologist and director of the Earth System Science Center at Pennsylvania State University, who was not involved with the new research. "This work builds on previous research establishing that, without a doubt, the record warmth we are seeing cannot be explained without accounting for the impact of human activity on the warming of the planet," Mann said. Record-breaking heat Record hot years have been occurring more frequently in recent decades. 2014 was the hottest year on record since 1880, but that record was quickly broken in 2015 and again in 2016. Research published earlier this year in Geophysical Research Letters found these three consecutive records in global temperatures were very likely due to anthropogenic warming. Record-breaking temperatures tend to attract attention because they are one of the most visible signs of global warming. As a result, understanding how and why the rate of record-breaking is changing is critical for communicating the effects of climate change to the public, King said. Previous research examined changes in rates of record-breaking temperatures in specific countries or regions. However, these studies couldn't analyze global temperature trends because they relied on gathering large numbers of daily temperature records from different sources, according to King. Additionally, they didn't directly attribute changes in record-breaking to human activity. In the new study, King developed a method to isolate the human role in changing rates of record-breaking temperatures globally. Unlike previous studies, the method uses a single source of temperature data, in this case global annual temperatures, allowing King to study temperature records on a global scale. King first looked at global temperature data from 1861 to 2005 and identified which years were hot record breakers. He then used a wide array of climate models to simulate global temperatures in this period. Some of the models included only natural influences on the climate such as volcanic eruptions, while other models featured both natural influences and human influences such as greenhouse gas emissions and the release of aerosols into the atmosphere. King found only the climate models that included human influences had the same number of record-breaking hot years as historical temperature records--15 to 21, on average. The models without human influences only had an average of seven record-breaking hot years from 1861 to 2005. He also determined human-caused climate change at least doubled the odds of having a record-breaking hot year from 1926 to 1945 and from 1967 onwards. The odds didn't increase from 1945 to 1967 because man-made aerosol emissions generated a cooling effect, which counteracted warming due to anthropogenic greenhouse gases. King's research can also be applied to quantify the influence of human activities on a specific record-setting event. He applied his method to record-setting hot global temperatures in 2016 and record-setting hot local temperatures in central England in 2014. He found human influence led to a 29-fold increase in the likelihood of seeing both new records compared to a situation with no human influence on climate. ### The American Geophysical Union is dedicated to advancing the Earth and space sciences for the benefit of humanity through its scholarly publications, conferences, and outreach programs. AGU is a not-for-profit, professional, scientific organization representing 60,000 members in 137 countries. Join the conversation on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and our other social media channels. Immune cells called "killer cells" target bacteria invading the body's cells, but how do they do this so effectively? Bacteria can quickly evolve resistance against antibiotics, yet it seems they have not so readily been able to evade killer cells. This has caused researchers to become interested in finding out the exact mechanism that killer cells use to destroy bacterial invaders. Although one way that killer cells can trigger bacterial death is by inflicting oxidative damage, it has not yet been at all understood how killer cells destroy bacteria in environments without oxygen. Now, for the first time, researchers have caught killer cells red-handed in the act of microbial murder, observing them as they systematically killed three strains of microbes: E. coli and the bacteria responsible for causing Listeria infection and tuberculosis. The process inflicts bacterial cell death regardless of whether the environment contains oxygen or not. Their findings, published in Cell, reveal that killer cells act methodically, shooting deadly enzymes into bacteria to "program" a complete internal breakdown and cell death. The researchers, from Boston Children's Hospital, the Wistar Institute and the University of Michigan (U-M), used an equally systematic approach to make the discovery. "We took three bacteria that are very different -- and to see which proteins were destroyed by killer cells -- we measured their protein levels before, during and after they were attacked," says Judy Lieberman, MD, PhD, of Boston Children's Program in Cellular and Molecular Medicine (PCMM), who is co-senior author on the study. Proteins are critical to life because they direct the use of nutrients and production of cellular machinery that bacteria need to survive. "Each strain of bacteria has about 3,000 proteins and we saw that -- in all three bacterial species -- about five to 10 percent of those proteins were slashed by the killer cells' death-inducing enzyme, called granzyme B," Lieberman says. "If you made a list of the proteins that bacteria absolutely needed to survive, it would be a small list -- interestingly, this seems to be identical to granzyme B's hit list." Deadlier than antibiotics To deliver the fatal blow of granzyme B, killer cells seek out surface markers on the body's cell surfaces that might indicate a bacterial invader has taken up residence inside the cell. Killer cells then latch onto the infected cell and use an enzyme to create a small pore in the cell's surface, through which they inject granzyme B. Once granzyme B gets into the cell, it passes into the invading bacterium and essentially destroys critical proteins for cell survival as well as its ribosomes, the pieces of bacteria's cellular machinery that actually make proteins. "The bacteria's ribosomes fall apart and stop functioning," says Lieberman, also a professor of pediatrics at Harvard Medical School. It's as if the bacteria's internal factory of life not only loses the blueprints for the parts it needs to make, but also suffers a catastrophic mechanical failure of its assembly line. "By discovering the bacterial proteins that killer cells 'take out,' we have identified potential therapeutic targets that could pave the way for a new class of antimicrobial drugs," Lieberman suggests. "We have a huge crisis of antibiotic resistance right now in that most drugs that treat diseases like tuberculosis or listeria, or pathogens like E.coli, are not effective," said Sriram Chandrasekaran, PhD, co-senior author of the study from U-M, in a press release. "So, there is a huge need for figuring out how the immune system does its work. We hope to design a drug that goes after bacteria in a similar way." Importantly, no matter how many times the researchers exposed the bacteria to granzyme B, the bacteria did not develop resistance to its fatal attack. It's possible that the only way bacteria can survive is to camouflage themselves so that killer cells cannot "see" them and shoot granzyme B into them. Lieberman is now searching for the specific mechanisms by which bacteria might evade killer cells. She's also investigating how similar "death pathways" take effect in fungi and parasites, such as those that cause malaria. ### In addition to Lieberman and Chandrasekaran, other authors on the paper are Farokh Dotiwala (Wistar Institute), Sumit Sen Santara (PCMM), Andres Ariel Binker-Cosen (Harvard University) and Bo Li (Harvard University and Broad Institute). This work was supported the National Institutes of Health (RO1 AI23265, T32 HL066987) and the Harvard Society of Fellows. A research team has found striking parallels between how archaeal and eukaryotic cells package and store their genetic material To Tom Santangelo, single-celled microorganisms called archaea are like ancient mariners, surviving among the most extreme conditions on Earth, including volcanic vents in the deep ocean. The Colorado State University researcher studies how these hardy microbes - which constitute one of three surviving domains of life - express their genes, produce their energy, and thrive in hot, lightless environments. It turns out, we're not so different - biochemically, anyway - from archaea after all. Santangelo, associate professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, was on a team that found striking parallels between how archaeal cells and more complex cells, including humans' and animals', package and store their genetic material. The breakthrough study, published in Science earlier this year, provided evidence that archaea and eukaryotic cells share a common mechanism to compact, organize and structure their genomes. The study was led by Karolin Luger, now a structural biologist at the University of Colorado Boulder. Most of the results reported in Science were completed while Luger was a CSU faculty member, from 1999 to 2015. A little high school biology review: Eukaryotes are cells with a nucleus and membrane-bound organelles, and they include fungal, plant and animal - including human - cells. They're set apart from their less complex counterparts, prokaryotes, by the absence of a nucleus. While archaea and bacteria are both prokaryotes, they are only distantly related. Archaea are the likely progenitors of eukaryotes and share many of the same proteins that control gene expression. One of life's most fundamental processes - the mechanics by which DNA bends, folds and crams itself into a cell nucleus - is common across all eukaryotes, from microscopic protists to plants to humans. Packed inside the nucleus of every eukaryotic cell is several feet of genetic material that is compacted in a very specific way. Small sections of DNA are wrapped, like thread around a spool, roughly two times around eight small proteins called histones. This entire DNA-histone complex is called a nucleosome, and a string of compacted nucleosomes is called chromatin. In 1997, Luger and colleagues first reported the exact structure of eukaryotic nucleosomes via X-ray crystallography. Science paper collaborator John Reeve had discovered in the 1990s that histone proteins were not limited to eukaryotes, but were also found in nucleus-free archaea cells. Reeve and Luger began a collaboration to crystallize histone-based archaeal chromatin and compare that structure with eukaryotic chromatin. After years of stops and starts and trouble growing reliable archaeal histone crystals - Luger called it a "gnarly crystallographic problem" - the scientists succeeded in resolving the structure of archaeal chromatin, revealing its structural similarity to eukaryotes. In the data, the archaeal DNA seemed to form long, curvy, repeating superhelices. The researchers weren't sure if the structure was real, or an artifact of the experiment. That's where Santagelo's team at CSU provided key expertise. "My group took up the challenge of determining whether the structure resolved in the crystals represented a biologically meaningful structure," he said. Santangelo's team made variants of the archaeal histones and tested how the cells fared, as they disrupted the DNA superhelix. They found that the more they destabilized the structure, the sicker the cells got. Their efforts underscored the merits of the structure Luger's group had determined. Being part of a team that provided so fundamental an insight as the ancestry of our cells was among the most rewarding moments of Santangelo's career. "The major impact of the paper, I think, is that the idea of compacting DNA into those structures is a very ancient idea - probably more than 1 billion years old," Santangelo said. "Histone proteins came on the scene, and once they got into and started packaging genomes, they largely made themselves indispensable to those cells that encoded them." Santangelo will continue conducting studies into the structure, function and energy transactions of archaea - those ancient mariners that now definitively represent a The study challenges a growing trend that has attempted to show that believing in the supernatural is something that comes to us 'naturally' or intuitively Religious beliefs are not linked to intuition or rational thinking, according to new research by the universities of Coventry and Oxford. Previous studies have suggested people who hold strong religious beliefs are more intuitive and less analytical, and when they think more analytically their religious beliefs decrease. But new research, by academics from Coventry University's Centre for Advances in Behavioural Science and neuroscientists and philosophers at Oxford University, suggests that is not the case, and that people are not 'born believers'. The study - which included tests on pilgrims taking part in the famous Camino de Santiago and a brain stimulation experiment - found no link between intuitive/analytical thinking, or cognitive inhibition (an ability to suppress unwanted thoughts and actions), and supernatural beliefs. Instead, the academics conclude that other factors, such as upbringing and socio-cultural processes, are more likely to play a greater role in religious beliefs. The study - published in Scientific Reports -- was the first to challenge a growing trend among cognitive psychologists over the past 20 years that has attempted to show that believing in the supernatural is something that comes to us 'naturally' or intuitively. The team started by carrying out an investigation on one of the largest pilgrimage routes in the world - the Camino de Santiago de Compostela, in northern Spain. They asked pilgrims about the strength of their beliefs and the length of time spent on the pilgrimage and assessed their levels of intuitive thinking with a probability task, where participants had to decide between a logical and a 'gut feeling' choice. The results suggested no link between strength of supernatural belief and intuition. In a second study, where they used mathematical puzzles to increase intuition, they also found no link between levels of intuitive thinking and supernatural belief. In the last part of their research they used brain stimulation to increase levels of cognitive inhibition, which is thought to regulate analytical thinking. This involved running a painless electrical current between two electrodes placed on the participant's scalp, to activate the right inferior frontal gyrus, a part of the brain that controls inhibitory control. A previous brain-imaging study had shown that atheists used this area of the brain more when they wanted to suppress supernatural ideas. The results showed that while this brain stimulation increased levels of cognitive inhibition, it did not change levels of supernatural belief, suggesting there is no direct link between cognitive inhibition and supernatural belief. The academics say that it is "premature" to explain belief in gods as intuitive or natural. Instead, they say their research supports a theory that religion is a nurture-based process and develops because of socio-cultural processes, including upbringing and education. Leading author Miguel Farias said: "What drives our belief in gods - intuition or reason; heart or head? There has been a long debate on this matter but our studies have challenged the theory that being a religious believer is determined by how much individuals rely on intuitive or analytical thinking. "We don't think people are 'born believers' in the same way we inevitably learn a language at an early age. The available sociological and historical data show that what we believe in is mainly based on social and educational factors, and not on cognitive styles, such as intuitive/analytical thinking. "Religious belief is most likely rooted in culture rather than in some primitive gut intuition." ### Amyloid fibrils are infamous for the role they play in serious neurological diseases in humans, such as Parkinson's or Alzheimer's. One trigger for Alzheimer's disease is the misfolding and aggregation of proteins such as tau and ABeta. This causes the formation of tiny fibrils that then accumulate in the brain. Specialists refer to these fibres as amyloid fibrils. Raffaele Mezzenga, Professor of Food & Soft Materials at ETH Zurich, has spent a long time studying amyloid fibrils, which he synthesises in the lab starting from non-toxic and edible precursors such as the whey protein component beta-lactoglobulin. He does this by heating the proteins in acid to degrade the original structure; the proteins are "denatured" and become fibrous. Multiple individual strands congregate and twist into a helix to form the mature amyloid fibrils in the lab. During the process, the whey proteins not only lose their original structure, but also their functionality. In the case of non-toxic food protein precursors, new functionalities are built, which are at the core of an intense research program in the group of Mezzenga. Transformation of an amyloid fibril An international team of amyloid experts led by Mezzenga has now made a fundamental discovery with amyloid fibrils generated by fragments of proteins from animal, human and disease related protein sources, made synthetically in the laboratory. The discovery has just been published in Nature Communications. Under certain circumstances, the fibrils can be transformed into a protein structure that has never been observed before in-vivo and seldom observed in in-vitro studies: an amyloid crystal. The scientists resolve for the first time the physical mechanism by which this transition takes place: this involves untwisting the fibril to form elongated, matchstick-like amyloid crystals without the need to unfold and refold the protein; that is, by simply getting rid of torsional energy associated with the twisted amyloid fibrils. In the past, researchers had only observed this phenomenon in the test tube but without really being able to identify the mechanisms leading from one structure to another; the amyloid crystals, nonetheless, have never before been found in living cells. For the research team, it is therefore difficult to say for the time being what implications the discovery will have in the field of amyloid-related diseases. Mezzenga is already sure, however, that the results are significant for protein folding and the formation of amyloid fibrils: "Our results shed new light on the self-organisation of proteins that have a tendency to form amyloids, and on the most stable status of proteins in general." Nick Reynolds, Research Scientist at Swinburne University of Technology, further believes this work will have major implications in understanding the mechanisms by which amyloid proteins misfold and aggregate in neurodegenerative diseases, eventually leading to the identification of potential new routes for the early diagnosis and treatment of these socioeconomically devastating conditions. The most stable form of protein Indeed, once they have formed, the crystals are likely to be the most stable possible form of a protein. This is due to the fact that they have a very low level of internal energy. In terms of the energy landscape, amyloid crystals lie in the deepest valley when compared to other forms of proteins - even lower than amyloid fibrils, which were previously thought to be the lowest-energy and most stable form of protein. Researchers have statistically and experimentally determined that energy is released when an amyloid fibril transforms into an amyloid crystal. "Our discovery means that the energy landscape of protein folding must now be revisited," says Mezzenga. Rarely found in nature Yet the situation is paradoxical from a statistical physics perspective, Mezzenga continues: "If the amyloid crystal represents the lowest possible energy state of a protein form, then most proteins would have to transition to this structure sooner or later." This is due to a well-established principle of statistical thermodynamics that states that in a system with many degrees of freedom, the state of lowest energy is the one most probable and thus most often observed. The same should hold true for proteins, which is why it is astonishing that amyloid crystals have never been found in natural systems such as cells, says Mezzenga. Mezzenga sees the explanation for this in the fact that cells contain special proteins (chaperones) that assist proteins to fold correctly. This is an energy-intensive process. In the test tube, however, where researchers have managed to produce amyloid crystals directly from amyloid fibril precursors, these enzymes were not present. "Protein-folding in living systems is, after all, much more complex than in the test tube," says Mezzenga. The fundamental behaviours of amyloid fibrils are is still not entirely understood and somewhat controversial. Mezzenga hopes that his work will help to improve understanding of how proteins with a tendency to form amyloids behave and what is the natural evolution of folded protein conformations in general. ### Reference Reynolds NP, Adamcik J, Berryman JT, Handshin S, Hakami Zanjani AA, Li W, Liu K, Zhang A, Mezzenga R. Competition between crystal and fibril formation in molecular mutations of amyloidogenic peptides. Nature Communications, published online 7th Nov 2017. doi:10.1038/s41467-017-01424-4 It is one of the driest regions of the Earth, yet, in a cave in the Egyptian Sahara, paintings have been found depicting people swimming. This stone-age art is thought to be up to ten thousand years old and falls into the so-called African Humid Period between 11,500 and 5,500 years before now. Climate scientists still puzzle about the rapidity of aridification and the climate processes that led to this. Now, a group of researchers from several European institutions found that northern high-latitude cooling played a role in triggering the rapid termination of the African Humid Period. According to the study, appearing in Nature Communications, the temperature drop in the Arctic and in the mid-latitudes of the northern hemisphere weakened strong winds at high altitudes over Africa, the so-called Tropical Easterly Jet. "This cooling reduced precipitation over Africa, and in combination with a range of other complex climate feedback mechanisms tipped the humid system towards aridification", explains the first author of the study, James Collins from Helmholtz Centre Potsdam - GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences and Alfred Wegener Institute - Helmholtz Center for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) in Bremerhaven. The findings are based on analyses of ancient plant leaf wax found in the sediments of the Gulf of Guinea in combination with computer models of the climate system. The wax lipids comprise n-alkanes, i.e. long-chain hydrocarbons, that are produced by plants to protect their leaves. Their hydrogen isotopic composition can be used as an indicator of past precipitation intensity. The wax isotopes told the researchers about rainfall in Cameroon and the central Sahel-Sahara over the past several millennia and showed a rapid aridification around 5500 years before now. Although the high-latitude cooling probably did not act alone in driving the aridification, it seems to be have been the missing piece in the puzzle and acted to set the aridification process in motion. "Based on our findings, it appears that future Arctic warming and reduced sea-ice cover could have a strong effect on tropical rainfall", says James Collins. Project leader Enno Schefu from the MARUM - Center for Marine Environmental Sciences at the University of Bremen, Germany, adds: "The project was funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft in the priority programme 'Integrated Analysis of Interglacial Climate Dynamics (INTERDYNAMIC)' with the aim to identify potential mechanisms triggering abrupt changes under current climatic conditions. With this study we could show that small changes in one area can have large impacts in remote places, something that should be considered in future assessments of climate projections." ### This is a joint press release by GFZ, MARUM and AWI. Neuroscientists who want to follow the nervous system's cellular conversations will soon have access to easy-to-use technology that simultaneously monitors neural activity at hundreds of different sites within the brain, thanks to a major engineering effort funded by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), the Allen Institute for Brain Science, the Gatsby Charitable Foundation, and Wellcome. The new probes are expected to give scientists a much clearer picture of how different parts of the brain work together to process information. In a $5.5 million collaboration led by researchers at HHMI's Janelia Research Campus, scientists at Janelia, the Allen Institute, and University College London (with grant funding from Gatsby and Wellcome) have worked over the past four years with engineers at imec, an international nanoelectronics research center in Leuven, Belgium, to build and test powerful new devices for detecting neural activity within the brains of living animals. The devices, called Neuropixels probes, place hundreds of recording electrodes across a large span of a rodent's brain, so that researchers can collect more meaningful data in a single experiment than other technologies currently allow. Neuropixels probes are expected to be available for purchase by research laboratories by mid-2018. The new probes are described in an article published in the November 9, 2017 issue of Nature. Some highlights from data presented in the Nature paper: This is the first report of a large (10 mm), dense (100 sites/mm) implantable neural recording device With each probe, scientists see hundreds of well resolved single neuron signal traces The probes can record simultaneously across multiple brain regions Researchers have recorded from more than 700 neurons using two Neuropixels probes Probes yielded high neuron count and excellent signal-to-noise performance with no special techniques required With nearly 1,000 electrical sensors positioned along a probe thinner than a human hair but long enough to access many regions of a rodent's brain simultaneously, the new technology could greatly accelerate neuroscience research, says Timothy Harris, senior fellow at Janelia, leader of the Neuropixels collaboration. "You can [detect the activity of] large numbers of neurons from multiple brain regions with higher fidelity and much less difficulty," he says. Scientists from the consortium will present data collected using prototype Neuropixels probes at the Annual Meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in Washington, DC, November 11-15, 2017. Their results demonstrate that the probes, together with new methods of data analysis, can be used to track the activity of hundreds or even thousands of individual cells in disparate brain regions. There are currently more than 400 prototype Neuropixels probes in testing at research centers worldwide, including 20 labs affiliated with Gatsby and Wellcome such as the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre, eight HHMI labs and are being used at large scale by researchers at the Allen Institute. "At the Allen Institute for Brain Science, one of our chief goals is to decipher the cellular-level code used by the brain," says Christof Koch, President and Chief Scientist at the Allen Institute for Brain Science. "The Neuropixels probes represent a significant leap forward in measurement technology and will allow for the most precise understanding yet of how large coalitions of nerve cells coordinate to give rise to behavior and cognition." "What we need to do as neuroscientists is to understand how a lot of neurons spread all over the brain work together," says neuroscientist Matteo Carandini. Carandini and his colleague Kenneth Harris run a lab at the University College London (UCL) whose team has worked with the prototype Neuropixels probes and helped guide their development. Until recently, Carandini says, it was possible to measure the activity of individual neurons within a specific spot in the brain or to reveal larger, regional patterns of activity--but not to do both at the same time. "As long as you place them appropriately, you can really study how different parts of the brain work together at the neuronal level. This is a game changer," he says. Janelia group leader Albert Lee, whose team has also been using Neuropixels prototypes and providing feedback on their development, says the ability to collect data from many different brain regions simultaneously will also reduce the number of experiments needed to glean a big-picture view of what happens in the brain when an animal performs a particular task. A single experiment can now replace a series of experiment each focused on a different brain region, he says. Neuropixels probes are similar to electrophysiology probes that neuroscientists have used for decades to detect extracellular electrical activity in the brains of living animals--but they incorporate two critical advances. The new probes are about as long as a mouse brain--so they pass through and collect data from many different brain regions at the same time. And recording electrodes are densely packed along their length, making it easier for researchers to pinpoint the cellular sources of brain activity. Finally, each of the new probes incorporates a nearly complete recording system - reducing hardware size, cost and eliminating hundreds of output wires. John O'Keefe of the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre at University College London and lead principal investigator on the Wellcome and Gatsby Charitable Foundation grants said he was eager for British involvement in the project right from the beginning. "It was clear to me that if these probes worked they would take our ability to relate single cell activity and behavior to a new level," O'Keefe says. "And they would be particularly useful in cortical areas related to spatial memory such as the hippocampus and entorhinal cortex." The Neuropixels project was launched in 2013, with an ambitious goal of dramatically advancing the technology available for detecting electrical activity in the brain. Although some labs did have the ability to record activity from hundreds of neurons at the same time, such experiments were costly and technically difficult, and the electrophysiology probes available to most researchers at the time had 16-64 sensors, limiting the number of cells users could monitor in an experiment. Harris and his colleagues agreed it was time to move things forward in a big way. "Janelia is a place where people are willing to push the envelope on what you might be able to do," Harris says. Rather than figuring out how to squeeze a few more sensors on an existing probe, Janelia scientists began talking about designing a new generation of probes that could record from hundreds of neural sites at once--and then manufacturing enough of them to supply the neuroscience community at an affordable cost. Harris consulted with semiconductor engineers who told him the idea was feasible. But it was clear from the outset that the development costs would be high. Fabricating hundreds of electrodes and placing them on a device slender enough to be inserted into the brain of a living animal was simply beyond the capacity of academic facilities, Harris says. "With the new probes, we're not really at the bleeding edge of technology, but we are far beyond the fabrication capabilities available to research laboratories," he explains. The probes that Janelia's neuroscientists wanted would have to be made by professional semiconductor engineers using state-of-the-art equipment. The project was likely to look risky to a typical government granting agency, Harris says. "We needed 5 million dollars--to make one thing," he notes. So he appealed to other sources. Recognizing an opportunity to accelerate the pace of neuroscience research, HHMI, the Allen Institute, the Gatsby Charitable Foundation, and Wellcome agreed to fund the endeavor. Imec, a state-of-the-art maker of silicon microcircuits, agreed to design and fabricate the devices. The nonprofit research center has expertise and facilities that were needed for the project, but does not usually manufacture products on an industrial scale. "They are great at making and designing things, and they were willing to consider projects for small volume output," Harris says. "Imec's expertise in analog design, deep silicon etch, biocompatible electrode fabrication and proprietary SOI CMOS processes makes us one of the few research and development institutions worldwide that is able to manufacture probes like these," stated Barundeb Dutta, Chief Scientist at imec. "The way that the probe was designed and fabricated and how it is already transforming neuroscience, points to the relevancy and promise of a new model in which private research foundations with deep expertise, fund the design and fabrication of breakthrough tools, which can then advance fundamental research." ### Harris and colleagues at HHMI, the Allen Institute, and UCL worked with imec to develop the Neuropixels probes, testing prototypes and ensuring the devices were practical for a wide range of experiments. The probe design also integrates components that transform the electrical signals that it detects into digital data ready for computational analysis. Scientists at UCL have developed new data analysis methods to transform that data into meaningful information about the activity of individual cells. Researchers from Lomonosov MSU, Faculty of Soil Science, have studied the resistance microorganisms have against gamma radiation in very low temperatures. The results have been published in the Extremophiles journal. Average temperature on Mars is -63 C, but in polar areas and at night it can be as low as -145 C. There is pressure lower 100-1000 times than on the Earth, strong ultraviolet and ionizing radiation. Until now, no one knew to what extent microorganisms can resist such extreme factors. By finding out the limits, scientists can assess the possibility of microorganisms and biomarkers surviving in various objects inside the Solar System. This information will become invaluable in planning astrobiological space missions, when it is important to carefully choose objects and regions of research, as well as thoroughly develop techniques for the detection of life. In their current paper, the authors studied the radiation resistance of microbial communities in permafrost sedimentary rocks under low temperature and low pressure. These sedimentary rocks are considered to be a terrestrial analog of regolith, the ground left after space weathering. The scientists assume that the potential Martian biosphere could survive in cryoconservated state, and that the main factor limiting its lifespan is the cells obtaining radiation damage. By defining the limit of their radiation resistance, one can estimate the length of microorganisms surviving in the regolith of various depths. "We have studied the joint impact of a number of physical factors (gamma radiation, low pressure, low temperature) on the microbial communities within ancient Arctic permafrost. We also studied a unique nature-made object - the ancient permafrost which has not melted for about two million years. In a nutshell, we have conducted a simulation experiment that well covered the conditions of cryoconservation in Martian regolith. It is also important that in this paper we studied the effect of high doses (100 kGy) of gamma radiation on prokaryotes' vitality, while in previous studies no living prokaryotes were ever found after doses higher than 80 kGy", - one of the authors, Vladimir S. Cheptsov, a post-graduate student at the Lomonosov MSU Faculty of Soil Science, Department of Soil Biology, told us. While simulating these factors influencing the microorganisms, the researchers used an original constant climate chamber that allows maintaining low temperature and pressure during gamma-irradiation. Authors also note that natural microbial communities were used as a model object, not pure cultures of microorganisms. The microbial communities studied have shown high resistance to the conditions of simulated Martian environment. After irradiation the total count of prokaryotic cells and number of metabolically active bacterial cells remained at the control level, while the number of cultured bacteria (those which grow on nutrient media) decreased ten times, and the number of metabolically active cells of archaea decreased threefold. The decrease in the cultured bacteria numbers was caused probably by a change in their physiological state, and not by death. The scientists have detected a fairly high biodiversity of bacteria in the exposed sample of permafrost, although the microbial community structure underwent significant changes after irradiation. In particular, actinobacteria populations of the genus Arthrobacter, which were not revealed in the control samples, became predominant in bacterial communities following the simulation. This was probably caused by the decrease in dominant bacterial populations, so the actinobacteria of the genus Arthrobacter could be detected by the researchers. The authors also suggest that these bacteria are more resistant to the simulated conditions. There were also studies which proved that these bacteria have a fairly high resistance to the ultraviolet radiation, and their DNA is well-preserved in ancient permafrost through millions of years. "The results of the study indicate the possibility of prolonged cryoconservation of viable microorganisms in the Martian regolith. The intensity of ionizing radiation on the surface of Mars is 0.05-0.076 Gy/year and decreases with depth. Taking into account the intensity of radiation in the Mars regolith, the data obtained by us makes it possible to assume that hypothetical Mars ecosystems could be conserved in anabiotic state in the surface layer of regolith (protected from UV rays) for at least 1.3-2 million years, at a depth of two meters for no less than 3.3 million years, and at a depth of five meters for at least 20 million years. The data obtained can also be applied to assess the possibility of detecting viable microorganisms at other objects of the Solar System and within small bodies in outer space" - the scientist added. The authors have for the first time proven that prokaryotes can survive irradiation with ionizing radiation in doses exceeding 80 kGy. The data obtained indicate both a possible underestimation of the radiation resistance of natural microbial communities and the need to study the joint effect of a set of extraterrestrial and cosmic factors on living organisms and biomolecules in astrobiological model experiments. ### The work was done in collaboration with scientists from the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Ioffe Physical-Technical Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, S.-Petersburg State Polytechnical University, Ural Federal University and the Petersburg Nuclear Physics Institute Named after B.P. Konstantinov of National Research Center "Kurchatov Institute." The research is conducted as a part of the Noah's Ark project, supported by the grant of the Russian Science Foundation (RSF). Study shows every minute counts when using tranexamic acid to treat life threatening bleeding after trauma or childbirth Survival benefit reduced by 10% for every 15 minutes treatment delay World Health Organization updates recommendations for tranexamic acid Doctors call for drug to be given by paramedics at accident scene and at the onset of severe bleeding after childbirth (postpartum haemorrhage) Research published as 'Blood Clock' art installation highlights need for urgent action to reduce bleeding deaths Major bleeds must be treated with tranexamic acid (TXA) as fast as possible since deaths occur quickly and the drug's life-saving benefits diminish with each passing minute, according to a new study published in The Lancet. Tranexamic acid reduces bleeding after trauma and childbirth by preventing blood clots from breaking down. It is inexpensive, heat stable and simple to administer intravenously. The study, led by researchers from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, builds on evidence from two of their large-scale international randomised trials looking at the effect of tranexamic acid in life threatening bleeding. The WOMAN trial (2017), [1] which involved 20,000 women with postpartum haemorrhage, and CRASH-2 (2010) [2] - a trial of 20,000 trauma patients. Both trials showed that tranexamic acid reduces death due to bleeding by a third when given within three hours. However, analysing data from 40,138 patients from the two trials combined, the new study found that treatment must be given within minutes rather than hours. Immediate treatment with tranexamic acid improved bleeding survival by 70% but thereafter the survival benefit decreases by 10% for every 15 minutes' delay until three hours, after which there was no benefit. There were a total of 3,558 deaths in the two trials, of which 1,408 (40%) were from bleeding. Most (63%, n=884) bleeding deaths occurred within 12 hours of onset. Deaths from postpartum haemorrhage (PPH) peaked 2-3 hours after childbirth. Traumatic bleeding kills over 2 million people each year and PPH, the leading single cause of maternal deaths worldwide, claims the lives of around 100,000 women each year, mostly in low and middle-income countries. The researchers are calling for tranexamic acid to be used worldwide as a frontline treatment to help reduce the global burden of deaths from severe bleeding. Following a detailed review of the evidence, the World Health Organization (WHO) recently published updated recommendations on the use of tranexamic acid. [3] The previous guidelines in 2012 - before the WOMAN Trial results were known - recommended use of tranexamic acid if other treatments failed. It now strongly recommends early use of intravenous tranexamic acid (within three hours of birth) in addition to standard care for women with clinically-diagnosed PPH following vaginal birth or caesarean section. WHO also highlighted the need for all health systems, regardless of their level of resources, to recognise that tranexamic acid is a life-saving intervention that should be made readily available for PPH management wherever emergency obstetric care is provided. Senior study author, Professor Ian Roberts from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, said: "Severe bleeding must be treated urgently - minutes matter, and using tranexamic acid quickly has the potential to save thousands of lives. "Trauma patients should be treated by paramedics at the scene of injury - many patients are getting TXA when they arrive at hospital which is often too late. For women with postpartum haemorrhage, bleeding deaths peak at two hours, so it is crucial that tranexamic acid is given as soon as life-threatening bleeding is diagnosed." The new research findings will be part of the discussion at a special event on postpartum haemorrhage taking place at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine on 9 November. The event brings together leading experts from the UK, Nigeria and Pakistan, including researchers involved in the WOMAN trial. [4] Speaking at the event will be Her Excellency Toyin Saraki, Founder-President of Wellbeing Foundation Africa and ambassador for the International Confederation of Midwives. The Nigerian philanthropist and maternal health campaigner said: "PPH is a major problem in Nigeria and across much of Africa, so it is extremely important that we can find practical solutions which could improve the chances of survival. I am delighted that we now have even more evidence about the potential benefits of tranexamic acid - which is simple to administer, safe and relatively inexpensive compared with patented medicines. Now we need to make sure it's made available." As part of the event, a unique art installation will be unveiled to raise awareness of postpartum haemorrhage and the need for urgent treatment. The 'Blood Clock' is created by Consultant Obstetrician Dr Graham Tydeman, who regularly deals with the problem of blood loss in childbirth. Every six minutes, somewhere in the world, a woman dies from PPH.[5] Dr Tydeman's installation graphically illustrates the number of deaths in a striking and thought provoking way. The two-metre high brass and clear acrylic Blood Clock is a mechanical sculpture using materials gathered from maternity wards or inspired by the issue of PPH and the tranexamic acid research. Fake blood fills newborn baby cots discarded by a maternity hospital - this then tips out every six minutes moving the hands of the clock, which represents a woman bleeding to death. A digital display counts the total number of deaths. Dr Tydeman made the Blood Clock in his workshop at his home in Fife, Scotland, taking inspiration from his day job as consultant and clinical lead in the department of obstetrics and Gynaecology, NHS Fife. He said: "PPH is challenging to predict and treat at the best of times, but in countries with limited health facilities and blood supplies the outcomes for women are far worse. Scientific evidence is vital in enabling doctors to save lives. We now know that tranexamic acid is safe and effective but must be given urgently - I hope the Blood Clock will help convey the importance of the WOMAN trial findings and the need for timely treatment." The Blood Clock will remain on display at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine until February next year. ### Notes to Editors: Angele Gayet-Ageron, David Prieto-Merino, Katharine Ker, Haleema Shakur, Francois-Xavier Ageron, Ian Roberts, for the Antifibrinolytic Trials Collaboration, Effect of treatment delay on the effectiveness and safety of antifibrinolytics in acute severe haemorrhage: a meta-analysis of individual patient-level data from 40 138 bleeding patients. The Lancet. DOI: 10.1016/S0140-6736(17)32455-8 As part of the systematic review the authors identified a total of 13 trials on tranexamic acid conducted between 1946 and 2017, but the ones included in this meta-analysis were the only two trials to assess the impact of time to treatment on treatment effectiveness. The authors explain that because treatment delay may be underestimated in trauma (many injuries are unwitnessed), and overestimated in post-partum haemorrhage (birth is taken as the time of bleeding onset), they did sensitivity analyses to test a range of plausible errors. Their results support the conclusion that prompt treatment is essential. Funding for the research was provided by UK NIHR Health Technology Assessment programme, Pfizer, BUPA Foundation, and J P Moulton Charitable Foundation (CRASH-2). UK Department of Health, Wellcome Trust, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Pfizer and LSHTM (WOMAN). 1. The WOMAN Trial results: The Woman trial collaborators: Effect of early tranexamic acid administration on mortality, hysterectomy, and other morbidities in women with post-partum haemorrhage (WOMAN): an international, randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. The Lancet, Vol 389, Issue 10084, 27 May-2 June 2017, Pages 2105-2116. http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(17)30638-4/fulltext The trial included 20,000 women in 193 hospitals across 21 countries. 2. CRASH-2 trial (The Lancet, 2011) http://www.thelancet.com/crash-2 3. WHO updated guidelines on tranexamic acid treatment for postpartum haemorrhage published in November 2017: http://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/tranexamic-acid-pph-treatment/en/ 4. Further information about the event at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (if you are interested in attending please contact press@lshtm.ac.uk): https://www.lshtm.ac.uk/newsevents/events/how-can-we-stop-women-bleeding-death-childbirth-woman-trial-panel-event-and-blood 5. Weeks, A The prevention and treatment of postpartum haemorrhage: what do we know, and where do we go to next? BJOG. 2015 Jan;122(2):202-10. doi: 10.1111/1471-0528.13098. Epub 2014 Oct 7. About the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine: The London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine is a world-leading centre for research and postgraduate education in public and global health, with more than 4,000 students and 1,000 staff working in over 100 countries. The School is one of the highest-rated research institutions in the UK, is among the world's leading schools in public and global health, and was named University of the Year in the Times Higher Education Awards 2016. Our mission is to improve health and health equity in the UK and worldwide; working in partnership to achieve excellence in public and global health research, education and translation of knowledge into policy and practice. http://www.lshtm.ac.uk The bigger the male, the higher his chances to successfully mate - this applies, at least, to thrips, insects measuring only two to three millimetres in length that are hard to recognise with the naked eye. The larger males not only drive off their smaller rivals, they also have better immune systems and produce more sperm. This is a discovery that was made by biologists at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU). Their study recently appeared in the international Journal of Insect Behaviour. "Larger males have better chances of procreating than their smaller rivals," says Dr Stephanie Kruger, the study's lead author. The researcher works alongside Dr Gerald Moritz, a professor of biology from Halle who has been studying thrips for many years. Kruger has investigated a species of thrips called Echinothrips americanus which is only 1.3 millimetres in size. This species is a pest insect that came to Europe from the USA at the end of the 20th century and is now a common occupant of Germany's greenhouses. These small insects, which belong to the order Thysanoptera, shouldn't be underestimated as the damage they cause to the agriculture industry and the horticulture sector can run into the millions. There are many reasons why the larger males have a higher reproduction success rate. "For one thing, strong males drive off their smaller rivals. Their size also allows them to more easily mount females when mating," says Kruger. Added to this is the fact that females from many different species of insect prefer larger males as they promise a higher probability of survival for the eggs and offspring. Furthermore, the animals produce more secretions, which females use as nutrients during egg production. There is even a benefit to male fertility: they produce more sperm. Until recently little had been scientifically known about the reproductive biology of thrips. The biologists from Halle were able to refute, for example, the wide-spread hypothesis that so-called sternal glands impact mating success. The actual purpose of these glands, located on the insect's abdomen, remains unclear. Kruger has a hypothesis, and further research should allow her to determine whether male thrips guard the pupae with the intention of being the first to mate with the hatched females. "We presume that the males mark the territory they are guarding," says Kruger. If they have a larger pore plate, and consequently more sternal glands, they have an advantage over other males by being able to demarcate their territory. The biologist would also like to analyse whether the females actively seek out their mates or whether the larger males are more successful in finding a copulation partner due to their higher levels of aggression. The research division "Development Biology" at MLU, led by Professor Gerald Moritz, has been studying thrips for many years. More than 6,100 species belong to their order. These micro-insects, with their stinging and sucking mouthparts, have caused a great deal of resentment in the agriculture industry. They infest cut flowers and damage fruit and vegetables by boring into the plant cells and extracting cell sap. For instance, they have diminished harvest yields of strawberries in the USA and Germany. In addition, several species transmit major plant viruses. Thrips are also a nuisance in the living rooms of plant lovers throughout the country. Their sucking leaves behind an optically displeasing, silver-grey discoloration on indoor plants like the rubber plant and palms. ### What turns people into radical jihadist clerics? A new book by an MIT political scientist offers a new answer: thwarted career ambitions. More specifically, the book finds, a certain portion of Muslim clerics who end up advocating for jihad -- war against Islam's foes -- started out as mainstream clerics looking for state-sponsored jobs where they could use their intellectual training, only to become unemployed, disenchanted, and radicalized. "Frustration with circumstances can make people angry and lead them to political violence," says Richard Nielsen, an associate professor in MIT's Department of Political Science and author of a newly published book on the subject, based on years of original research. While that's a general truth explaining a number of forms of political radicalization, Nielsen's work specifically probes, in close detail, what happens to trained Muslim clerics, using his own on-the-ground observations and deep analysis of online texts clerics produce. Nielsen finds that about 10 percent of the clerics writing on the internet are jihadists, though he notes that clerics publishing online are not representative of all of Islam. But many of those who gain an audience this way, he has found, first failed to make a living in mainstream society. "If they don't have as many connections, they're at greater risk of not making good on the investment they put into their legal training, and at greater risk of becoming jihadists," Nielsen explains. He calls this the "blocked ambition" cause of jihadist activity. It is not the only way people become radicalized, to be sure, but represents an underexplored one, he says. Nielsen's book, "Deadly Clerics: Blocked Ambition and the Paths to Jihad," is being published this week by Cambridge University Press. It is his first book. Among the clerics Nielsen's book is the fruit of two main avenues of research. He spent two years doing research among students training to be clerics in Cairo. Additionally, he performed a deep textual analysis of the online writings of a sample group of clerics, to see what proportion developed radical leanings; he did that in part through computerized searches for key words, phrases, and textual patterns. The result is a work that is equal parts anthropological investigation and big-data analysis of Islamic writing. All told, Nielsen wound up scrutinizing a group of about 200 clerics. "I try to draw the reader into the world of Muslim clerics in the same way that I have spent almost the last decade getting immersed in this world," Nielsen says. "I wanted to do something more in the tradition of anthropology." Of course, not everyone who becomes a jihadist is a thwarted cleric, and in Nielsen's account, there are at least two common paths to jihadism. On the one hand, some jihadist clerics become attached to radicalism first, before engaging in clerical study. On the other hand, Nielsen's research shows that a nontrivial portion of radical clerics are people who seemingly did not start out intending to become political radicals, but moved in that direction after their job possibilities and career prospects, either in academia or other state-sponspored venues, evaporated. "It's a minority [of clerics] who fit the story," Nielsen says. "But I think it's an important minority." The "blocked ambition" hypothesis also helps underscore a larger feature of the jihadist world, namely, the extent to which radical clerics tout their own academic credentials as a way of seeking status. As Nielsen observes in the book, this applies to many of the best known jihadist clerics, including Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), and Ayman al-Zawahiri, present leader of al-Qaeda. Nielsen's book is also the first study that systematically moves toward an estimate of how many Muslim clerics are in fact jihadist clerics, who justify and encourage terrorism and other acts of war. To be sure, Nielsen notes, the group of clerics who publish online differs from the entire population of clerics in two possible ways: Some clerics with an internet presence are high up in the formal religious hierarchy, while others have been expelled from it. Still, analyzing how many radicals exist in his sample group is a step forward quantitatively. "It was bigger than I expected, but smaller than some would claim," Nielsen says of his estimate. "No one has known what percentage of clerics are jihadists in any domain. ... It's something I hope to put out there in the scholarly literature and have other people work from." Anthropology plus big data Nielsen's research for his new book has also generated a second book project, which he is now pursuing, about the ways the online world helps shape authority and communication in the Islamic world. In a development that will support that project, Nielsen was one of 35 scholars nationally to be named an Andrew Carnegie fellow for the 2017-18 academic year, a prestigious award granted by the Carnegie Corporation of New York. As with the "Deadly Clerics" book, he aims to blend a big-data style of textual analysis with political analysis. "One of my goals with this book is to push forward the possibility in young researchers' minds that this is a combination of methods they could pursue," Nielsen says. "In the era of big data, we're actually going to have to get better at interpreting what other humans meant when they did something." Nielsen has posted his original data sets for "Deadly Clerics" online and invites other researchers and scholars to use them for their own analyses. "I'm not worried about competition," Nielsen says. "I'd actually like more researchers working on this topic." ### Additional background ARCHIVE: Three MIT scholars awarded prestigious Carnegie fellowships http://news.mit.edu/2017/three-mit-scholars-carnegie-fellowships-0426 ARCHIVE: 3 Questions with Richard Nielsen: How political science helps combat terrorism http://news.mit.edu/2017/richard-nielsen-how-political-science-helps-combat-terrorism-0203 ARCHIVE: Why sign rights treaties? http://news.mit.edu/2014/why-sign-human-rights-treaties-1020 Global climate change and the human impact on marine ecosystems have led to dramatic decreases in the number of fish in the ocean. It has also had an unforseen side effect: because overfishing decreases the numbers of jellyfish competitors, their blooms are on the rise. The GoJelly project, coordinated by the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research, Germany, would like to transform problematic jellyfish into a resource that can be used to produce microplastic filters, fertilizer or fish feed. The EU has just approved funding of EUR 6 million over 4 years to support the project through its Horizon 2020 programme. Rising water temperatures, ocean acidification and overfishing seem to favor jellyfish blooms. More and more often, they appear in huge numbers that have already destroyed entire fish farms on European coasts and blocked cooling systems of power stations near the coast. A number of jellyfish species are poisonous, while some tropical species are even among the most toxic animals on earth. "In Europe alone, the imported American comb jelly has a biomass of one billion tons. While we tend to ignore the jellyfish there must be other solutions," says Jamileh Javidpour of GEOMAR, initiator and coordinator of the GoJelly project, which is a consortium of 15 scientific institutions from eight countries led by the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research in Kiel. The project will first entail exploring the life cycle of a number of jellyfish species. A lack of knowledge about life cycles makes it almost impossible to predict when and why a large jellyfish bloom will occur. "This is what we want to change, so that large jellyfish swarms can be caught before they reach the coasts," says Javidpour. At the same time, the project partners will also try to answer the question of what to do with jellyfish once they have been caught. One idea is to use the jellyfish to battle another, man-made threat. "Studies have shown that the mucus from jellyfish can bind microplastic. Therefore, we want to test whether biofilters can be produced from jellyfish. These biofilters could then be used in sewage treatment plants or in factories where microplastic is produced," the GoJelly researchers say. Jellyfish can also be used as fertilizers for agriculture or as aquaculture feed. "Fish in fish farms are currently fed with captured wild fish, which does not reduce the problem of overfishing, but increases it. Jellyfish as feed would be much more sustainable and would protect natural fish stocks," says the GoJelly team. Another option is using jellyfish as food for humans. "In some cultures, jellyfish are already on the menu. As long as the end product is no longer slimy, it could also gain greater general acceptance," said Javidpour. Finally yet importantly, jellyfish contain collagen, a substance very much sought after in the cosmetics industry. Project partners from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, led by Nicole Aberle-Malzahn, and SINTEF Ocean, led by Rachel Tiller, will analyse how physical characteristics (hydrography, temperature), biological characteristics (abundance, biomass, ecology, reproduction) and biochemical parameters (stoichiometry, food quality) affect the initiation of jellyfish blooms. Based on a comprehensive analysis of triggering mechanisms, origin of seed populations and ecological modeling, the researchers hope to be able to make more reliable predictions on jellyfish bloom formation of specific taxa in the GoJelly target areas. This knowledge will allow sustainable harvesting of jellyfish communities from various Northern and Southern European populations. This harvest will provide a marine biomass of unknown potential that will be explored by researchers at SINTEF Ocean, among others, to explore the possible ways to use the material. A team from SINTEF Ocean's strategic program Clean Ocean will also work with European colleagues on developing a filter from the mucus of jellyfish that will capture microplastics from household products (which have their source in fleece sweaters, breakdown of plastic products or from cosmetics, for example) and prevent these from entering the marine ecosystem. Finally, SINTEF Ocean will examine the socio-ecological system and games, where they will explore the potentials of an emerging international management regime for a global effort to mitigate the negative effects of microplastics in the oceans. "Jellyfish can be used for many purposes. We see this as an opportunity to use the potential of the huge biomass drifting right in front of our front door," Javidpour said. ### Japanese scientists show how the expression of a single gene, doublesex1, in the embryo of the ancient crustacean Daphnia magna determines the growth of gender-specific traits The rich mane of a lion, the colorful tail of a peacock, examples of sexual dimorphism are abundant. Osaka University Professor Hajime Watanabe has been researching the genes that are the basis for why male and female bodies of the same species differ. In two new papers, his lab reports the molecular regulation and spatial expression of the aptly named gene, doublesex1, in Daphnia magna. This ancient crustacean provides a model for explaining the evolution of sexual dimorphism in the animal kingdom. "Sex determination can be broadly divided into two categories: genetic sex determination and environmental sex determination (ESD)," says Watanabe. In normal conditions, Daphnia magna reproduces asexually to only form females. However, in times of high stress, such as a shortage of food, it will apply ESD to also asexually produce males, which will contribute to sexual reproduction. In the first study, using TALEN-based gene editing, the group successfully attached a fluorescent reporter to the doublesex1 gene to watch the spatial expression of doublesex1 in the Daphnia magna embryo in real time. The study shows when and where in the embryo doublesex1 is first expressed and how that expression changes with time to produce male traits. "Our results suggest a time- and site-specific role of doublesex1. The gene is only recruited when and where it is needed," says Watanabe. The findings break the expression of dobulesex1 for male development into six stages, including two previously unidentified stages, stomodeal invagination and cumulus migration. Although both genders carry the gene, the temporal expression of doublesex1 is much longer in males than females, suggesting certain factors behave differently in the two sexes. In the second study, Watanabe demonstrates the transcription factor is responsible for expressing doublesex1. Vrille is known to have a role in growth and circadian rhythms, but the group discovered that it's sensitive to environmental stress. Watanabe's team found that suppressing Vrille expression in male-developing embryos or forcing its expression in female-developing embryos caused the embryos to show signs of the opposite sex and change the doublesex1 expression. Most of the embryos in the experiments died, probably because Vrille is crucial for many other biological functions besides sex development, but the data, Watanabe says, made it clear that Vrille activates the transcription of doublesex1 through gene co-option. "Gene co-option is an evolutionary method through which genes take new functions. Humans do not have Vrille. They have an ortholog, E4BP4/NFLIL3," he says, adding that studying this co-option in Daphnia magna could give insight on the evolution of E4BP4/NFLIL3 in humans. The findings of the studies are consistent with other animals and, Watanabe stresses, support the use of Daphnia magna to study the evolution of sexual dimorphism. "A number of groups have studied the development of sex-specific traits in model organisms such as mouse and Drosophila. These models are informative, but they are not suitable for studying evolution. Daphnia magna has a more ancestral position and unique sex system," he says. ### Scientists from RUDN University took an active part in the development of a chemical compound that would help to stop convulsions during epileptic seizures. The results of the study were published in Chirality. Epilepsy is a chronic neuralgic disease which causes convulsive seizures in humans and other animals. The pathogenesis of this disease is paroxysmal - very strong, acute, repetitive - discharges in the nerve cells of the brain that cause convulsions. Anticonvulsants help to stop the epileptic fit. The drug itself is a powder that is dissolved in water and injected into a person who has such a seizure. In order to obtain such a drug, scientists have developed a compound with a chirality - an asymmetric carbon atom (chiral center) which, with an absolutely identical chemical composition and similar structure, leads to a configuration incompatibility of the left and right forms of the molecule (a good analogy would be left and right hands). Thus, the nearest environment of the chiral center is a tetrahedron - a regular trigonal pyramid in the middle of which there is a chiral carbon atom and at its vertices there are substituents (atoms or groups of atoms replacing hydrogen atoms in hydrocarbon fragments) of various types. The chirality of such a "construction" is that all these four substituents are differently arranged in space relative to each other. In other words, if we isolate individual 3D models of these tetrahedra from the structure of the molecule and try to combine them, they will not coincide. "One of the most important areas of our scientific research is chemicals that have potential biological activity. In this case, the studied compounds have a specific activity - they are anticonvulsants. This is a common property of compounds of this class, but in order for compounds to show these properties more efficiently, they must be chirally (optically) pure, that is, the asymmetric centers of all molecules in the total substance mass must be of the same configuration. The published paper is devoted to the method of separation of racemic mixtures which contain molecules with various absolute (R or S) configurations of chiral carbon atoms," said Victor Khrustalev, Doctor of Chemical Sciences, Head of the Department of Inorganic Chemistry of the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics and Natural Sciences of RUDN University. Scientists synthesized and studied the structure of 3-ethyl-2-phenylpyrrolidin-2-one (EPP) showing anticonvulsant activity. The named compound can exist in three forms: as two chirally pure R / S stereoisomers and a racemate - a mixture of molecules with different R and S configurations of the asymmetric center. All three described forms show biological activity to varying degrees. The authors found that the compound effectively helps to stop convulsions only when it is chirally pure, that is, it contains molecules of only one configuration: either R or S. It should be noted that when the compound is produced under normal conditions a racemate is always formed, which makes it difficult to use in medical practice. In the course of the work scientists synthesized the compound with the desired chemical formula in the form of a racemate, which was confirmed by the methods of NMR and IR spectroscopy. Then, with the use of high-resolution liquid chromatography the authors divided the racemic mixture into optically pure stereoisomers. Thus, the researchers separated the necessary forms of a given chemical compound, which can later serve as a basis for a new drug. The scientists confirmed that there are molecules of only one configuration in the isolated forms after examining them by means of X-ray diffraction analysis. ### The work was carried out in collaboration with scientists from the University of Houston (Houston, Texas, USA), Marquette University (Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA) and New Mexico Highlands University (Las Vegas, New Mexico, USA). (New York, NY - November 8, 2017)-- Researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai have created the first mathematical model that can predict how a cancer patient will benefit from certain immunotherapies, according to a study published in Nature. Scientists have long sought a way to discover whether patients will respond to new checkpoint inhibitor immunotherapies and to better understand the characteristics that indicate a tumor can be successfully treated with them. The proposed mathematical model, which captures aspects of the tumor's evolution and the underlying interactions of the tumor with the immune system, is more accurate than previous genomic biomarkers in predicting how the tumor will respond to immunotherapy. "We present an interdisciplinary approach to studying immunotherapy and immune surveillance of tumors," said Benjamin Greenbaum, PhD, the senior author, who is affiliated with the departments of Medicine, Hematology and Medical Oncology, Pathology, and Oncological Sciences at The Tisch Cancer Institute at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. "This approach will hopefully lead to better mechanistic predictive modeling of response and future design of therapies that further take advantage of how the immune system recognizes tumors." This novel model also has the potential to help find new therapeutic targets within the immune system and to help design vaccines for patients who do not typically respond to immunotherapy. To create this model, researchers used data from melanoma and lung cancer patients being treated with immune checkpoint inhibitors. The model tracked many properties within the immune response to the drugs, particularly neoantigens, which are specific to mutating and growing tumors. Neoantigens have the potential to be prime immunotherapy targets, and the proposed framework will likely be useful in studies of acquired resistance to immunotherapy and may be crucial for understanding the circumstances in which immunotherapy causes autoimmune-like side effects. The first author of the study is Marta ?uksza, PhD, a computer scientist from the Simons Center for Systems Biology at the Institute for Advanced Study. Dr. Greenbaum and Dr. ?uksza also played an integral role in a companion piece of research led by researchers Vinod P. Balachandran, MD, Taha Merghoub, PhD, and Steven D. Leach, MD, at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK) that was also published in Nature today. That study showed how a similar model can be used to understand immune response in patients with pancreatic cancer who survive longer than others. Both studies demonstrate that this is a likely path forward to understanding when the immune system will lead to productive recognition of a tumor. "This research represents a big step forward in understanding why some tumors are more aggressive than others and being able to predict rationally which neoantigens will be the most effective at stimulating an immune response," said Dr. Balachandran, a member of the David M. Rubenstein Center for Pancreatic Cancer Research at MSK, and corresponding author of the companion study in Nature. ### This research was part of Stand Up To Cancer's "Convergence" model funding, which brought together teams of scientists and clinicians from different fields and different institutions to figure out how to bring the benefits immunotherapy to more patients. It was supported by a Stand Up To Cancer-American Cancer Society Lung Cancer Dream Team Translational Research Grant (SU2C-AACR-DT17-15), a Stand Up To Cancer-National Science Foundation-Lustgarten Foundation Convergence Dream Team Grant, a Phillip A. Sharp Innovation in Collaboration Award from Stand Up To Cancer, the Janssen Research & Development LLC, the STARR Cancer Consortium, the Pershing Square Sohn Cancer Research Alliance, the NIH R01 CA205426, the V Foundation, the Lustgarten Foundation, the National Science Foundation (NSF) 1545935, the Swim Across America, Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy, the NCI K12 Paul Calabresi Career Development Award for Clinical Oncology K12CA184746-01A1. The work was also supported in part by the MSKCC Core Grant (P30 CA008748). "It is extraordinary to see the Stand Up To Cancer 'Convergence' model, which integrates quantitative and clinical sciences, yield results like these. The potential benefit for patients diagnosed with melanoma or cancer of the lung or pancreas is exciting because these are some of the most challenging diagnoses for patients and their doctors and this research will help give patients the best information about the options they have," said Stand Up to Cancer President and CEO Sung Poblete, PhD, RN. "This research has tremendous value in predicting which patients may respond to immunotherapy before treatment begins, which will help us get the right medicine to the right patient. In addition the model provides new insights that will help researchers develop new immunotherapies for these cancers." About the Mount Sinai Health System The Mount Sinai Health System is New York City's largest integrated delivery system encompassing seven hospital campuses, a leading medical school, and a vast network of ambulatory practices throughout the greater New York region. Mount Sinai's vision is to produce the safest care, the highest quality, the highest satisfaction, the best access and the best value of any health system in the nation. The System includes approximately 7,100 primary and specialty care physicians; 10 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 ranked No. 18 on U.S. News & World Report's "Honor Roll" of top U.S. hospitals; it is one of the nation's top 20 hospitals in Cardiology/Heart Surgery, Diabetes/Endocrinology, Gastroenterology/GI Surgery, Geriatrics, Nephrology, and Neurology/Neurosurgery, and in the top 50 in four other specialties in the 2017-2018 "Best Hospitals" issue. Mount Sinai's Kravis Children's Hospital also is ranked in six out of ten pediatric specialties by U.S. News & World Report. The New York Eye and Ear Infirmary of Mount Sinai is ranked 12th nationally for Ophthalmology and 50th for Ear, Nose, and Throat, while Mount Sinai Beth Israel, Mount Sinai St. Luke's and Mount Sinai West are ranked regionally. For more information, visit http://www.mountsinai.org/, or find Mount Sinai on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. The layered superconducting material is characterized by a crystal structure in which a SnAs layer (wherein Sn and As are two-dimensionally bonded to develop superconductivity) and a Na layer (the spacer layer) are alternately laminated. Considering that such a layered structure is similar to that of a cuprate- or iron-based high-temperature (high-Tc) superconductor, it is possible that in SnAs-based layered materials, superconductivity is developed as a result of the unconventional pairing mechanism. The research group of Yoshikazu MIZUGUCHI (Associate Professor) and Yosuke GOTO (Project Researcher) specializes in the discovery of two-dimensional layered structures--various materials can be designed by laminating different kinds of layers. As an example, in 2012, this research group also reported the discovery of novel layered superconducting material systems, Bi 4 O 4 S 3 and LaO 1-x F x BiS 2 , based on bismuth (Bi) and sulfur (S). To add, as the two-dimensional crystal structure gives rise to a low-dimensional electronic state, researchers are actively studying unique quantum phenomena such as high-temperature superconductivity. Regarding NaSn 2 As 2 , Mizuguchi asserts that although the transition temperature of 1.3 K (-271.85C) is not exactly high, it is anticipated that new materials will be developed based on the SnAs conductive layer, thereby clarifying the mechanisms underlying the increase of the transition temperature as well as those responsible for high-transition-temperature superconductivity. At Tokyo Metropolitan University, the Research Center for Superconductivity Science and Engineering represented by Professor Takashi HOTTA was established in 2016; Yoshikazu MIZUGUCHI is a faculty member in the Research Center. One of the major objectives of this Research Center is to become a hub of superconductivity research in Japan; it aims to achieve this by promoting the discovery of new quantum critical phenomena, particularly superconductivity, by preparing pure single crystals, measuring their physical properties using state-of-the-art experimental methods, and promoting theoretical researches on exotic superconductivity. This study was supported by Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, and by the Japan Science and Technology Agency. The manuscript reporting this finding has been published online in the Physical Society of Japan's Journal of the Physical Society of Japan. ### On Nov. 9 at the world's largest conference and expo for design-related industry professionals, UAIPW Director Esther Sternberg, MD, and the U.S. General Services Administration will discuss findings of their Wellbuilt for Wellbeing study. TUCSON, Ariz. - The health of millions of office workers--and the cost of lost time due to workplace-related illnesses--may be positively impacted by research that will be presented by the University of Arizona Institute on Place and Wellbeing and the U.S. General Services Administration at the 2017 Greenbuild International Conference and Expo, the world's largest conference and expo for design-related industry professionals. The presentation will take place Thursday, Nov. 9, at 8 a.m. (EST) at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center, 415 Summer St., Boston, Mass. The University of Arizona Institute on Place and Wellbeing (UAIPW) has teamed up with the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) to carry out research providing GSA the data needed to develop best practices and policies to optimize workplace design for health. UAIPW Director Esther Sternberg, MD, and Research Associate Casey Lindberg, PhD, together with GSA's Kevin Kampschroer, director of the Office of Federal High-Performance Buildings, will discuss their findings on the effects of office workstation design and various indoor environmental quality factors on physiological stress, physical activity and sleep quality. Their study, "Wellbuilt for Wellbeing," uses real-time wearable human health sensors, as well as real-time environmental sensors from Aclima, Inc., to monitor federal workers' heart activity, physical movement and sleep quality. Research and technology partner Aclima designed and deployed the sensor network to measure multiple characteristics of the indoor environment. The results of this multi-year study will help GSA develop guidance and best practices to design and operate buildings that promote occupant health and wellbeing. "This research has the potential to affect the lives of millions of office workers and reduce the hundreds of billions of dollars lost each year in the United States due to illnesses linked to the work environment," said Dr. Sternberg, who also is director of research and professor with the University of Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine and the UA College of Medicine - Tucson. "People spend 90 percent of their time indoors, yet little is known about how different environmental conditions and designs affect human health and wellbeing, especially measurable physiological health outcomes. Fifty million U.S. workers spend almost 25 percent of their time in an office building and are at an increased risk of sedentary behavior, increased stress and poor sleep quality. This study will help design professionals partner with health professionals to create healthful spaces through data-driven design." "Previous work on environmental conditions in the workplace concentrated on eliminating dangerous levels of certain gases and chemicals, a do-no-harm perspective," said Dr. Lindberg, who is on the faculty of the UA College of Architecture, Planning and Landscape Architecture. "Yet the workplace has the potential to do much more--to be a space that enables a person to thrive, not just survive." ### UAIPW is at the leading edge of sensor-based design and health research, providing the information necessary to design such health and wellbeing office spaces. A joint venture of the UA Center for Integrative Medicine, UA College of Medicine - Tucson and UA College of Architecture, Planning and Landscape Architecture, the UAIPW also links expertise with other UA entities, including the UA College of Science, UA Department of Psychology and UA Eller College of Management. UAIPW's highly interdisciplinary teams actualize the university's commitment to a vision of human health that fully encompasses the role of the built and natural environment in health, wellbeing and healing. Often called the federal government's landlord, GSA operates an inventory of more than 370 million rentable square feet at more than 8,500 owned and leased locations. With this large portfolio, GSA is in a unique position to influence policy and best practices to optimize working conditions in both the public and private sectors. The Center for Applied NanoBioscience and Medicine is doing its part to protect the health of astronauts on long-duration missions, including NASA's Journey to Mars. The center, located at the University of Arizona College of Medicine - Phoenix, is a co-principal investigator on a grant awarded to the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine. The grant will fund research on the effects of simulated space radiation on the human gastrointestinal tract. Frederic Zenhausern, director of the Center for Applied NanoBioscience and Medicine and a professor at the College of Medicine - Phoenix, said UA scientists will provide microfluidic gut microsystem and biodosimetry tools to Wake Forest University scientists. The lab's share of the grant is $943,000 over four years. The innovative Human-Microbial Cross-Talk human "gut-on-a-chip" provides a platform for scientists to monitor how solar events and cosmic rays affect humans in space. The grant is one of 10 awarded by NASA's Translational Research Institute at Baylor College of Medicine for research projects in lymphatic flow, radiation damage resistance, minimally invasive surgical techniques and the effects of the microbiome on health during long spaceflights. "This is the first TRI initiative from NASA's Human Research Program that will help to solve some of the challenges of health management for astronauts on extended space exploration missions," Zenhausern said. "It represents an exciting opportunity to be part of an outstanding group of experts at Wake Forest, NASA and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory." "The University of Arizona has a longstanding and renowned history of research partnership with NASA, particularly through the Department of Astronomy and Lunar and Planetary Laboratory," said UA President Robert C. Robbins. "We are so excited to add the UA Health Sciences to this tradition of collaboration with the space agency." The human gut-on-a-chip provides a platform for studying a biological model of the human gastrointestinal tract that mimics the actual conditions and processes that occur within the gut. It allows scientists to see how cells from individuals respond to certain drugs or environmental exposure, allowing them to formulate personalized therapies. With organ-on-a-chip technology, researchers can analyze the complex interactions between human cells and the microbial ecosystems of the gut, predicting their effects on health, disease onset or even cognitive performance, and study the action of probiotics, nutritional compounds or drugs. In 2016, NASA established the Translational Research Institute to research and develop innovative approaches to reduce risks to humans on long-duration exploration missions. The institute was awarded $246 million for six years, and is led by Baylor College of Medicine with partners including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the California Institute of Technology. ### About the University of Arizona College of Medicine - Phoenix The University of Arizona College of Medicine - Phoenix admitted its inaugural class of first-year medical students in August 2007 and is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year. The college inspires and trains exemplary physicians, scientists and leaders to optimize health and health care in Arizona and beyond. The college is uniquely positioned to accelerate the biomedical and economic engines in Phoenix and the state by leveraging vital relationships with key clinical and community partners. For more, visit phoenixmed.arizona.edu/tenyears. All babies across Europe should be routinely screened for critical congenital heart defects (CCHD) within 24 hours of their birth, say a group of experts led by a University of Birmingham Professor and Honorary Consultant Neonatologist at Birmingham Women's Hospital. The European Pulse Oximetry Screening Workgroup (EPOSW), a group of neonatologists and paediatric cardiologist, including Presidents of leading European Neonatal Scientific Societies, has published a consensus statement recommending screening with pulse oximetry for all babies across Europe. CCHD occur in around two in every 1,000 newborn babies, and are a leading cause of infant death. Timely diagnosis is crucial for the best outcome for these babies, but current screening methods may miss up to 50% of affected newborn infants, and those sent home before diagnosis frequently die or suffer major morbidity. However, babies with CCHD often have low blood oxygen levels which can be detected quickly and non-invasively by pulse oximetry screening (POS), using a simple sensor placed on newborn infants' hand and foot. This medical device monitors the oxygen saturation of a patient's blood through their skin, as opposed to measuring oxygen levels directly through a blood sample. EPOSW's statement, published in Lancet Child Adolescent Health, is a culmination of almost a decade's work and calls for POS in all European countries for newborn babies after six hours of life or before discharge - preferably within 24 hours of birth. The recommendations follow the PulseOx study led by a team from University of Birmingham and Birmingham Women's Hospital in 2011 which screened over 20,000 newborn babies for critical heart defects using POS. This study, and an important meta-analysis of the test published by the same team in 2012, has led to POS being used by an increasing number of hospitals in the UK and Europe. However, to date, only a few countries such as Poland, Ireland and Switzerland have issued national guidelines recommending universal screening with pulse oximetry. Senior author Professor Andrew Ewer, of the Institute of Metabolism and Systems Research at the University of Birmingham, said: "These recommendations are the culmination of almost a decade's work driven by one focus; to prevent as many babies as possible from dying as a result of undetected heart defects. "Surgical and catheter interventions for CCHD now lead to excellent outcomes for most cases of CCHD, but timely detection is essential. "POS improves early detection of CCHD in newborn babies by identifying those with low oxygen saturations. "POS has been shown to be simple, quick, painless, consistent and cost-effective and acceptable to both staff and parents. "We have tried to create common, shared, flexible, and evidence-based recommendations for use and standardisation of POS for early detection of CCHD across Europe. "These recommendations should be considered at a national level as an approach to better identify CCHD, and other life-threatening conditions, in newborn babies." ### The UK National Screening Committee is currently considering the evidence for POS and whether it should be introduced to the UK national screening programme. For more information or to arrange interviews contact Emma McKinney, Communications Manager (Health Science), University of Birmingham: +44 (0)121 414 6681 or email e.j.mckinney@bham.ac.uk NOTES TO EDITORS * The University of Birmingham is ranked amongst the world's top 100 institutions. Its work brings people from across the world to Birmingham, including researchers, teachers and more than 5,000 international students from over 150 countries. * Manzoni et al (2017). 'Pulse oximetry screening for critical congenital heart defects: a European consensus statement'. Lancet Child Adolescent Health. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S2352-4642(17)30066-4 * The European Pulse Oximetry Screening Workgroup comprises of Paolo Manzoni, Gerard R Martin, Luc JI Zimmermann, Anne de-Wahl Granelli, Avroy A Fanaroff, Ilona C. Narayen, Daniele De Luca, Julie Thomas-Chabaneix, Thorsten Orlikowsky, Umberto Simeoni, Irana G. Soldatova, Julije Mestrovic, Barry S Rodgers-Gray, Virgilio P Carnielli, Antonio Del Vecchio, Sergio Picardo, Robert M Tulloh, Maximo Vento, Manuel Sanchez Luna, and Andrew Ewer. * The authors represent the following institutions and organisations: - Neonatology and Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, S.Anna Hospital, Turin, Italy - Children's National Health System, Washington, DC, USA - Neonatology Division, Complutense University of Madrid, Madrid, Spain - Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, University Hospital of Split, Split, Croatia - Division of Pediatrics, Universite de Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland - Neonatology Division, Maastricht UMC+, Maastricht, the Netherlands - Institute of Metabolism and Systems Research, University of Birmingham, UK - Birmingham Women's Hospital, Birmingham Women's and Children's NHS Foundation Trust, UK * A pulse oximeter is a machine which can measure, non-invasively, the amount of oxygen being carried around the body by the red blood cells called oxygen saturations. Oxygen from the lungs is bound to hemoglobin in the red-blood cells forming oxyhemoglobin. If oxygen is not bound then this forms de-oxyhemoglobin. In health, almost all haemoglobin is oxyhemoglobin and so the oxygen saturations (i.e. the percentage of haemoglobin which has bound oxygen) is close to 100%. The pulse oximeter measures this by passing light through the peripheral blood vessels (e.g. a finger-tip in an adult or a hand or foot in a baby). Oxyhaemoglobin and de-oxyhaemoglobin absorb this light in different way and the proportion of light absorbed can be analysed by software within the oximeter which then calculates the percentage of haemoglobin saturated with oxygen. * To read the PulseOx Study led by the University of Birmingham in 2011 visit: http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(11)60753-8/abstract and for the meta-analysis visit http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(12)60107-X/fulltext * Birmingham Women's Hospital, part of Birmingham Women's and Children's NHS Foundation Trust, is a centre of excellence, providing a range of specialist health care services to over 50,000 women and their families every year from Birmingham, the West Midlands and beyond. As well as delivering over 8,000 babies a year, it offers a full range of gynaecological, maternity and neonatal care, as well as a comprehensive genetics service, which serves men and women. Its fertility centre is one of the best in the country, while the fetal medicine centre receives regional and national referrals. The hospital is also an international centre for education, research and development with a research budget of over 3 million per year. In April 2016, it was announced as the national miscarriage research centre - the first of its kind in the UK - in partnership with Tommy's baby charity. The epidermis, the outermost part of our skin, is our most important protection towards the outside world. Our ability to survive depends on the epidermal barrier being intact. To keep the barrier functioning, every single cell needs to know what to do. That is especially difficult in the epidermis, which constantly renews itself. The process behind it is little understood so far. Of vital importance for building the barrier are especially tight connections between the cells. The so called tight junctions close the space between cells and control the transportation of molecules. The plan to form tight junctions can be found in every layer of the epidermis, nevertheless they are only developed in the outer layer. "Why it is like that was a mystery so far," says Matthias Rubsam first author of the study. "Using new microscopy techniques, we could show that the receptor of a well known growth factor, EGF, plays an important role in tight junction barrier formation in the epidermis. Actually, EGF is responsible for the cell division and so far was only described in the lower layers of the epidermis." Another aspect has something to do with a more recent field of cell biology, the mechanobiology. "Similar to railway coupling, cells can feel via connections among each other whether they are under pressure or under tension," the scientist explains. "The coupling triggers a signal which regulates the receptor. The activity of the coupling mechanism, the receptor and of the barrier molecules must always be at equilibrium." Disruption of this balance could cause known skin diseases like neurodermatitis or psoriasis. The new findings that coupling mechanisms and the receptor are important for keeping the balance may explain why common anti-tumor treatments targeting the receptor have heavy side effects for the skin. With this knowledge consequences of tumor therapies could be improved. ### This study using mice with defects in the skin barrier was conducted in close collaboration with researchers of the Max-Planck-Institute for Biology of Ageing (Sara Wickstrom), and universities in Yale (Aaron Mertz) and Tokyo (Masayuki Amagai, Akiharu Kubo). The results have been published in Nature Communications. Original publication: E-cadherin integrates mechanotransduction and EGFR signaling to control junctional tissue polarization and Tight Junction positioning Matthias Rubsam, Aaron F. Mertz, Akiharu Kubo, Susanna Marg, Christian Jungst, Gladiola Goranci-Buzhala, Astrid C. Schauss, Valerie Horsley, Eric R. Dufresne, Markus Moser, Wolfgang Ziegler, Masayuki Amagai, Sara A. Wickstrom, and Carien M. Niessen Nature Communications DOI: 10.1038/s41467-017-01170-7 What happens when mixed race couples have children of their own? A new study by a sociologist at the University of Kent (UK) reveals how mixed-race British parents draw from their ethnic and racial backgrounds in identifying and raising their children. While mixed race people have been studied both in North America and Europe, no studies have looked specifically at what happens when mixed race people become parents. In her new book, entitled Multiracial Parents: Mixed Families, Generational Change and the Future of Race (NYU Press, November 2017), Professor Miri Song, of the University's School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research, draws on detailed narratives to present a revealing portrait of how multiracial identity is - and is not - transmitted to children. Professor Song's research found that many multiracial parents feel that their very existence - and the families they and their children constitute - are becoming increasingly normalised and are central to challenging existing racial boundaries and the historical meanings of race. But Professor Song explains in the book that the decisions made by multiracial parents are not only varied, but often tinged with uncertainty and ambivalence. Will ethnic and racial ancestries and identifications be passed on to their children, and how may this process vary for Black/White, South Asian/White, and East Asian multiracial people? Furthermore, she points to the fact that two people with the exact same multiracial backgrounds (for instance Black and White), and with partners of the same racial backgrounds (White), can still identify and raise their children in quite different ways. This is because many factors, such as the physical appearance of children, the parents' own upbringing, and regional location, influence this process. As an example, Professor Song shows that it is fully possible that couple A, who live in a mostly White suburb, may tell their child that they are White, while couple B, who live in an area with many more Black people, may decide that their child should identify as, and be seen as, multiracial. Moreover, the importance of race, and concerns about racism, can vary significantly across the multiracial population. ### For more information or interview requests contact Martin Herrema at the University of Kent Press Office. Tel: 01227 823581/01634 888879 Email: M.J.Herrema@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 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 22nd in the Guardian University Guide 2018 and 25th in the Complete University Guide 2018, and in June 2017 was awarded a gold rating, the highest, in the UK Government's Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF).In the Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings 2015-16, it 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 (http://www.kent.ac.uk/about/partnerships/eastern-arc.html). 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. Kent has received two Queen's Anniversary prizes for Higher and Further Education. The prognosis for people with an infected diabetic foot ulcer is worse than was previously thought, according to new research. More than half the patients in the research study did not see their ulcer heal over a year - and one in seven had to have part or all of their foot amputated. Foot ulcers are open wounds and they affect around a quarter of the 3.3 million people in the UK living with diabetes. The wounds develop because diabetes damages the nerves and blood vessels in the feet. These wounds are chronic, slow to heal and prone to infection, and it is infection that normally leads to some of the severe consequences such as losing a limb or multiple amputations. The research, led by Professor Andrea Nelson at the University of Leeds, set out to examine the outcomes for people with infected diabetic foot ulcers and the results underline the need for people at risk of foot ulcers to be closely monitored. Not only do the ulcers cause disability, there are big financial implications for the NHS. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence or NICE puts the annual cost for treating diabetic foot wounds at 650 million. The University of Leeds is at the forefront of research into preventing and treating diabetic foot ulcers as well as skin wounds and pressure sores more generally, a problem that affects people with poor circulation, obesity or limited mobility - and one that is expected to grow as society gets older. This latest study is published in the journal Diabetic Medicine. The researchers tracked 299 people who had attended a diabetic clinic with an infected foot ulcer, a big enough sample for it to be representative of the picture across the UK. The patients were followed up a year later. By then, one in seven people (17.4 percent) had part or all of their foot amputated. Among the others, less than half (45.5 percent) had seen their ulcer heal. The researchers say the outcomes are worse than previously thought - a conclusion based on a more accurate statistical analysis of the scale of the problem. Professor Nelson from the Faculty of Medicine and Health said: "Foot ulcers are a very nasty condition. They're painful and are debilitating. People with foot ulcers have limited mobility, and that brings with it a whole set of other risk factors - obesity and heart disease, for example. "The key point is that people need to be seen quickly if an ulcer begins to form - that gives health workers the greatest chance of trying to treat the condition." Dr Michael Backhouse, a podiatrist and Senior Research Fellow at the University of Leeds, said: "The results of our study are important and should help clinicians caring for patients with diabetes to identify those most at risk for poor outcomes so that we can look to provide further support." ### The research was funded by the National Institute for Health Research. Wound care research The University of Leeds has a long tradition of research activity regarding wounds, such as pressure ulcers or bed sores, leg ulcers as well as diabetic ulcers. Researchers working at the University of Leeds have been involved in many studies informing current practice about pressure ulcer prevention using specialist beds and mattresses - and leg ulcer care, such as the use of compression therapy for treating venous leg ulcers. Much of this research has been done in partnership with nurses in Leeds. Celebrating wound care practice The University will next week host a one-day conference and public events in partnership with Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust looking at wound care over the last 100 years. The conference will look at the latest science and research of wound care and also at the history of wound care via the experience of nurses who served in the First World War. Professor Nelson will present the latest work on wound infection and Dr Una Adderley, also from the School of Healthcare, will discuss the current evidence around leg ulceration. Half of all people with a leg ulcer do not receive a diagnosis of the cause of their leg ulcer so will not receive appropriate treatment. Dr Adderley said: "The NHS is starting to address this gap in practice. But there is a fairly urgent need to get clinicians working in the community to ensure their patients get the right treatment, and that can make a big difference to people with leg problems." The University is also involved in the Legs Matter campaign to raise awareness about, and early treatment for, leg ulcers. The conference and public events on Friday, November 17th are free to attend but registration is compulsory via this Eventbrite page. Notes to Editors For more information, please contact David Lewis, media relations officer, University of Leeds; +44 113 343 8059 or email d.lewis@leeds.ac.uk The full paper can be accessed online: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/dme.13537 Funding acknowledgement This project was funded by the NIHR Health Technology Assessment Programme, HTA 09/75/01. The views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the NHS, the NIHR or the Department of Health. University of Leeds The University of Leeds is one of the largest higher education institutions in the UK, with more than 33,000 students from more than 150 different countries, and a member of the Russell Group of research-intensive universities. We are a top ten university for research and impact power in the UK, according to the 2014 Research Excellence Framework, and are in the top 100 for academic reputation in the QS World University Rankings 2018. Additionally, the University was awarded a Gold rating by the Government's Teaching Excellence Framework in 2017, recognising its 'consistently outstanding' teaching and learning provision. Twenty-four of our academics have been awarded National Teaching Fellowships - more than any other institution in England, Northern Ireland and Wales - reflecting the excellence of our teaching. http://www.leeds.ac.uk Follow University of Leeds or tag us in to coverage Twitter Facebook LinkedIn Instagram NIHR The National Institute for Health Research (NIHR): improving the health and wealth of the nation through research. Established by the Department of Health, the NIHR: funds high quality research to improve health trains and supports health researchers provides world-class research facilities works with the life sciences industry and charities to benefit all involves patients and the public at every step For further information, visit the NIHR website http://www.nihr.ac.uk University of Leicester and Medical Research Council researchers lead study to monitor effectiveness of drugs on cancer patients University and MRC researchers have developed a new platform for assessing anti-cancer drug efficacy in lung cancer that is more reflective of patient response than previously used model systems The platform relies on the derivation of 'explants' from tumour tissue obtained fresh from surgery and treatment of these samples ex vivo with anti-cancer drugs The platform has the potential to significantly reduce drug attrition rates and increase the success of anti-cancer drugs in the clinic, thus improving patient benefit A novel approach developed by researchers from the University of Leicester and the MRC Toxicology Unit could help to predict how well patients respond to drugs designed to fight various forms of cancer. The team has developed a patient-relevant pre-clinical platform called 'explants', whereby tumour samples are taken from cancer patients immediately following surgery and drug responses are then assessed in situ. The 'explant' approach is cheap, quick, and reproducible and has already given results that are more predictive of patient outcome than other methods. The study, which was led by Professor Catrin Pritchard and Dr Howard Pringle from the University of Leicester Cancer Research Centre and Professor Marion MacFarlane, who is based within the MRC Toxicology Unit at Leicester, applied the 'explant' approach to lung cancer. They found that the different cell types within a tumour are retained intact and that the way in which the tumour 'explants' respond to drugs predicts how well individual patients respond in the clinic. Professor Pritchard explained: "Despite the huge level of investment into the development of new anti-cancer drugs by academia and the pharmaceutical industry, most do not deliver patient benefit in the clinic. "We carried out this study to test whether our 'explant' approach gives patient-relevant data with regard to standard-of-care chemotherapy and provide strong evidence that this is indeed the case for lung cancer. "If incorporated into drug development procedures, then the 'explant' platform has an opportunity to make a huge contribution to the anti-cancer drug development pipeline." Professor MacFarlane added: "This work is important as it will reduce the attrition rates of cancer drug development and improve the efficiency and speed with which anti-cancer drugs are incorporated into the clinic to give patient benefit. This will also substantially reduce the costs of developing novel anti-cancer drugs. "We are very excited by the potential of our platform and have already expanded our approach to other cancer types such as breast cancer, mesothelioma and colorectal cancer with excellent results in each of these disease types." The study was published in Cancer Research earlier this year: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28202521 In recognition of the potential of the platform, Cancer Research UK Therapeutic Discovery Laboratories previously co-funded method development and following this successful pilot study the team has now completed a research agreement with both Cancer Research UK Therapeutic Discovery Laboratories and LifeArc to test a range of novel anti-cancer drugs, attracting investment totalling >500K. Tim Hammonds, Deputy Director of Drug Discovery at Cancer Research UK Therapeutic Discovery Laboratories, said: "Access to clinical tissues for our drug discovery projects should provide vital information on the mechanisms and possible application of new therapeutics. We are delighted to be working in this collaboration." Dr Justin Bryans, Executive Director, Drug Discovery at LifeArc, said: "We are very excited about this collaboration. The ability to test experimental drugs against explants will provide valuable information and enable us to expedite the discovery of new cancer therapies. In addition, if we can use this platform to inform oncologists of the appropriate treatment for their patients then this could transform the way we treat cancer." This has allowed the establishment of a 'Cancer Explant Facility' located in the University's Robert Kilpatrick Clinical Sciences Building at the Leicester Royal Infirmary Site. This facility is also being supported by the University's Leicester Drug Discovery and Diagnostics Centre (LD3), and the Leicester Precision Medicine Institute (LPMI). Alasdair Gaw, the Commercial Director of both LD3 and LPMI, commented: "The development of this pre-clinical platform is a great example of how a collaborative approach based on excellent scientific research can positively impact clinical practice to provide patient benefit and typifies why Leicester is a leading centre for precision medicine." ### The work was funded through the award of an MRC Doctoral Training Grant that allowed the appointment of Ellie Karekla, a PhD student who worked as part of the research team. Additional funding, for consumables and overheads, was provided by the MRC Toxicology Unit, following on from a previous MRC Development Gap Fund Award to Professor MacFarlane and also by funding from the MRC Confidence in Concept Award (institutional translational funding). The Leicester Experimental Cancer Medicine Centre, funded by NIHR and Cancer Research UK, provided support in the form of tissue collection nurses. Barry Sharp, John Pugh and Helen Reid from the Centre for Analytical Science from Loughborough University contributed to the assessment of drug delivery within explant samples. Images available here: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/d7ijy0rpetuo0x8/AAD8UuAG295smwUCUeocnzxwa?dl=0 A chemist at The University of Texas at Arlington is the recipient of a prestigious award from the American Chemical Society for his efforts to improve the educational experience of students in the field of analytical chemistry. The ACS Division of Analytical Chemistry presented Kevin Schug, Shimadzu Distinguished Professor of Analytical Chemistry, with the 2017 J. Calvin Giddings Award for Excellence in Education. The award recognizes scientists who have enhanced the personal and professional development of students in analytical chemistry. "Given the past recipients of this award, this is a tremendous honor," Schug said. "Teaching at UTA has been a really fulfilling part of my job, and it is really humbling to be honored like this for that effort." Schug, who also directs UTA's Collaborative Laboratories for Environmental Analysis and Remediation or CLEAR Lab, becomes the second member of UTA's Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry to win the Giddings Award in three years. Purnendu "Sandy" Dasgupta, the Hamish Small Chair in Ion Analysis and Jenkins Garrett Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry, received the honor in 2015. "Dr. Schug is passionate about teaching and about improving science education in general and chemistry education in particular," College of Science Dean Morteza Khaledi said. "He has received numerous awards and commendations for his teaching and mentoring efforts, and the ACS J. Calvin Giddings Award is a well-deserved affirmation of his extraordinary efforts on behalf of students to make sure they receive the best possible educational experience." Schug has been given significant recognition previously for his teaching. He was named a Fellow of the UT System Academy of Distinguished Teachers in 2016, following his receipt in 2014 of the UT System Regents' Outstanding Teaching Award. In 2016 he won a Tech Titans of the Future - University Level Award along with Laura Mydlarz, UTA associate professor of biology, for their leadership of the Achieving Success in Science through Undergraduate Research and Engagement (ASSURE) program. His research activities have also been recognized. He was named to The Analytical Scientist magazine's 2014 Power List as one of its Top 40 Under 40, signifying recognition as one of the top young analytical scientists in the world. In 2013, Schug received the ACS Division of Analytical Chemistry Young Investigator in Separation Science Award. In 2010, he won the Eli Lilly and Co. Young Investigator Award in Analytical Chemistry, which recognizes researchers whose work has applications in the pharmaceutical industry. In 2009, he received a National Science Foundation Early Career Development Award, which is given to junior faculty who show excellence in education and research. That same year he was also named an Emerging Leader in Chromatography by LCGC Magazine. Schug received the UTA College of Science Teaching Excellence Award in 2014 and the College of Science Research Excellence Award in 2010. He also received the Outstanding Mentor Award from UTA's chapter of Sigma Xi, the Honor Society for Scientists and Engineers, each year from 2010-13, as well as in 2015 and 2017. In 2013 he, Dasgupta and Gary Christian, Professor Emeritus of Chemistry at the University of Washington, co-authored a rewrite of Analytical Chemistry, an influential and widely-used textbook originally written by Christian, now in its 7th edition. Schug has been heavily involved in science education for over a decade. He was co-principal investigator on a collaborative $2 million National Science Foundation-funded STEM Talent Expansion Program or STEP grant, which included successful efforts to aid freshman engineering, physics, math and chemistry students pass difficult courses early in their college careers. He is also the founder and director of a K-12 science outreach program, Diversity in Science in the United States called DISCUS, and he served as a project leader in UTA's National Science Foundation STEM Talent Expansion Program, which focuses on efforts to improve retention and graduation rates of STEM students. Since joining the UTA Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Schug's research has been focused on the theory and application of separation science, mass spectrometry and spectroscopy for solving a variety of analytical problems spanning the energy, environmental, biological and pharmaceutical fields. He was instrumental in building the relationship between UTA and Shimadzu Scientific Instruments, Inc., which in 2013 led to the creation of the Shimadzu Institute for Research Technologies, comprised of multiple instrumentation facilities, each with a different research focus, and operated under the "centralized research resources" model. Schug received a B.S. in Chemistry in 1998 from the College of William and Mary, and earned his Ph.D. in Chemistry from Virginia Tech in 2002 under the supervision of Harold M. McNair, who received the J. Calvin Giddings Award in 2000. From 2003 to 2005, Schug was a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Vienna in Austria. He came to UTA in 2005. ### Something almost magical happens when you put a tray full of sloshing, liquid water into a freezer and it comes out later as a rigid, solid crystal of ice. Chemists at the University of Utah have pulled back the curtain a little more on the freezing process, particularly in clouds. Their research shows that when water droplets freeze in clouds, the structure of the ice crystal isnt necessarily the classic hexagonal snowflake structure. Rather, a more disordered ice structure forms more easily than hexagonal ice under certain cloud conditions, allowing the water droplets in clouds to turn to ice more rapidly than previously predicted. The work reconciles theoretical models of clouds with observations of freezing rates. The study is published in Nature. Why water freezes Even in warm climates, precipitation usually starts with water droplets in clouds turning to ice. Why? These droplets of liquid can grow to a certain size, says Valeria Molinero, chemistry professor at the University of Utah, but to grow to a size that is large enough that it can fall from the sky, these droplets have to grow much larger. The best way to grow larger is to turn to ice. A small atmospheric particle, called an aerosol, can start the process of freezing in chilled water. Or the process can start spontaneously, with a small region of ordered water molecules appearing within the droplet. If that crystallite is large enough, then the droplet can freeze and continue to grow by pulling in the surrounding water vapor. The process of crystals growing from a small nucleus is called nucleation. Overcoming the barrier Small crystal nuclei face a barrier to growth. Because of the interactions between a small solid and its liquid surroundings, a crystallite has to grow to a certain size to be able to continue growing and not simply melt away. Picture a hill. If you push a rock up a hill but dont make it all the way to the top, the rock rolls back down to where you started. But if you push it far enough, it rolls down the other side. The top of the hill (called the free energy barrier) sets the critical size for continuing to grow the crystallite. The focus of our paper is showing what the structure of the crystallite at the top of this barrier is and what is the implication for the rate of nucleation, Molinero says. Previously, chemists assumed that the structure of ice at the top of the energy barrier was the hexagonal structure seen in snowflakes (although snowflakes are much larger than crystallites). Its a very stable structure. The assumption that it's hexagonal is the more intuitive one, says Laura Lupi, a postdoctoral scholar and first author on the Nature paper. Jumbled layer cake Previous simulations found that under some cloud conditions, however, crystallites with a disordered structure were more favored. These stacking disordered structures are a layer-cake mix of molecules that dont settle into either the hexagonal or cubic crystal structure. In their study, Lupi and Molinero found that at a temperature of 230 K, or -45 degrees Farenheit, the free energy barrier for the stacking disordered crystallite is 14 kJ/mol smaller than that for hexagonal ice. In other words, disordered ice has a hill much smaller than hexagonal ice and forms around 2,000 times faster. This helps cloud modelers understand better their observational data regarding freezing rates in clouds. Previous nucleation models using hexagonal ice couldnt capture all of a clouds behavior because those models extrapolated nucleation rates across cloud temperatures without understanding the effects of temperature on those rates. Lupi and Molineros study begins to correct those models. Rates of ice nucleation can only be measured in a very narrow range of temperatures, Molinero says, and it is extremely challenging to extrapolate them to lower temperatures that are important for clouds but inaccessible to the experiments. By virtue of their size, snowflakes are more stable as hexagonal ice, Lupi and Molinero say. Their findings only apply to very small crystallites. Lupi says that their work can help cloud modelers create more accurate models of the phase of water within clouds. If you have so many water droplets at a certain temperature, you want to predict how many will turn into ice droplets, she says. Better cloud models can lead to better understandings of how clouds reflect heat and produce precipitation. Molinero says that their work improves fundamental understanding of how quickly water forms ice a process that plays out in clouds and freezers every day. And it is a process, not an instantaneous event, Molinero adds. The transformation is not just that you go below zero and thats it, she says. Theres a rate at which the transition happens, controlled by the nucleation barrier. And the barrier is lower than previously anticipated. ### This work was supported by the National Science Foundation. This press release and images can be found here. After publication, the full study can be found here. A new study by Virginia Tech researchers tracks land cover changes in the Chobe district of Northern Botswana and provides information that will allow governments and nonprofit organizations to improve dryland management strategies in the region. The study was published in Arid Land Systems: Science and Societies, a special issue of the journal Land. "There is an incredibly dynamic and complex relationship between land cover types that are constantly changing. Not much is known about what happens in these transitional savanna ecosystems located between more arid and wetter climate zones, information critical to their management," said lead author J. Tyler Fox, who earned his doctorate in fish and wildlife conservation in Virginia Tech's College of Natural Resources and Environment in 2016. "If we can understand how the landscape has changed over decades and what that does to water quality, human health, and ecosystem health, we can begin to make predictions for the future," said senior author Kathleen Alexander, professor of wildlife conservation in the College of Natural Resources and Environment and a Fralin Life Science Institute affiliate. The team conducted the study in Alexander's long-term field site through CARACAL (Centre for Conservation of African Resources: Animals, Communities, and Land Use), a nonprofit organization she and her husband, Mark Vandewalle, established in Northern Botswana. Vandewalle, a co-author of the study, is a wildlife biologist with a focus on ecosystem function in African savanna habitats and serves as CEO of CARACAL. The study, funded by the National Science Foundation and Forest Conservation Botswana, examined Landsat satellite data from the past 30 years to track broad land cover change in the Chobe district, a 21,000-square-kilometer area encompassing urban, rural, communally managed, and protected land. The Botswana government wanted to better understand how land cover is changing over time and how this might impact ecosystem services. "The region's savanna landscapes provide critical resources for both people and animals. Communities in these areas rely heavily on forest resources, such as firewood, thatch for roofs, and plants for food and medicine. These areas are also used in tourism and even in spiritual or cultural ceremonies," noted Fox, who is currently a post doctoral fellow at the University of Arkansas. "This study is one of the first to quantitatively examine the loss of forested areas and other land cover changes in savanna environments," said Richard Yuretich, program director for the National Science Foundation's Dynamics of Coupled Natural and Human Systems Program, which funded the research. "The complex relationships among climate, ecology, and human activities reveal the overwhelming influence of people on the loss of woodlands. This paves the way for effective management of these diminishing resources." The study observed a long-term trend of decreasing woodland cover and increasing shrubland. Grasslands also varied considerably over the study period. Surprisingly, loss of woodlands tended to be higher in protected forest reserves compared with the larger Chobe District. "We looked specifically at drought, fire, and elephant disturbance as possible causes for these changes," Fox said. "Dryland ecosystems are especially vulnerable to human impacts," Alexander added. "Domestic animals, wildlife, and people congregate in riparian areas near scarce water resources, impacting these regions. Using this approach, we can begin to track change and identify possible drivers, system couplings, and hot spots of degradation. We can see how various stressors are affecting the landscape and begin to engage proactive rather than reactive management approaches." According to Vandewalle, many people in Botswana believe that there has been a linear loss of trees, a progression from forested land to shrubs to bare ground. "Our data, however, reveal extensive regeneration of trees in certain areas in association with the right conditions," Vandewalle noted. "Change is complex, dynamic, and can be bidirectional in these systems." The team also discovered that while many people believe the region's fast-growing elephant population is a major driver of forest cover loss, there was little evidence for this in their analysis. Fire, however, was a driving force in land cover change. Fox explained that over a 13-year period, there were nearly 10,000 fires in the Chobe district. More than 85 percent of those happened during a time when there were no storms or lightning, meaning that most of the fires originated from human activities. "We were able to pinpoint where and when fires were happening, which allowed us to make some fire management suggestions," Fox said. "For instance, thatch collection activities appear related to fire hotspots, which extended into several of the protected forest reserves. These areas can be more intensively targeted for management and outreach activities. People rely heavily on natural resources extracted from this landscape and need to have sustainable access to those materials to ensure livelihood security." Alexander is working with the Botswana government to develop an active monitoring approach based on the groundwork laid by this study. "Across the globe, forest products remain an essential natural resource," she said. "We need to understand the status of those resources and identify the primary threats and drivers. Decadal studies of this nature are necessary to understand system dynamics and fundamental to the development of improved and targeted management." Alexander also noted that the implications of the study have the potential to benefit not only Botswana, but dryland systems globally. "Drylands represent over 41 percent of the global landmass and are extremely vulnerable to human impacts," she added. "What we're learning in Botswana has application to other drylands that are under increasing threat and pressure to supply human and animal needs." ### Scientists have developed a new device that could revolutionise our understanding of the brain by allowing researchers to map the activity of complex neural networks that control behaviour and decision making, in a way never before possible. The Neuropixels probes are described in a paper published today in Nature. Neuropixels - tiny silicon probes thinner than a human hair - can simultaneously record the activity of hundreds of neurons across multiple different brain regions in mice and rats. Existing technologies can only provide detailed data on very small areas of the brain, limiting our understanding of how responses in different parts of the brain coordinate to perform complex behaviours. The new probes will allow scientists to understand the brain at a level of detail and at a scale that previously seemed impossible. This new approach may eventually allow researchers to understand how disorders like depression or Alzheimer's can alter the neural circuits in our brain and could lead to new ways of treating these diseases. In 2018, Neuropixels will be available at cost price to neuroscientists across the globe. There are currently around 400 prototypes in testing at leading research centres worldwide. Leading neuroscientists are already using them in their work to uncover how complex networks of brain cells support our ability to learn and make decisions (see case study below for more details). The human brain is thought to be the most complex object in the universe, with over 70 billion neurons that control how we think, feel and behave. To unravel this complexity, scientists need to measure thousands of individual neurons, all over the brain, at the same time. Current recording devices are dependent on wire electrodes that limit the number that can be simultaneously placed in the brain; they typically have no more than a few dozen sensors. The new silicon probes have 960 recording sites distributed across large parts of the brain, enabling researchers to record from more neurons simultaneously in a single experiment than ever before. The tiny super-sensitive electrodes on the Neuropixels probes can record the activity of hundreds of individual neurons from multiple brain regions, in real time. This will give scientists a much clearer picture of how different parts of the brain work together to process information. It could help researchers better understand how decisions are made and how emotion is regulated. Neuroscientists use the mouse and rat brain as models for the human brain, as a lot of the structure and connectivity that exists in human brains also exists in rodents, at a smaller scale. The probes were developed by an international team funded by $5.5 million from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), the Allen Institute for Brain Science, the Gatsby Charitable Foundation and Wellcome. Scientists at HHMI's Janelia Research Campus, the Allen Institute and University College London (UCL) worked together with engineers at nanotechnology company imec to build and test the probes. The Neuropixels probes are 10mm long (roughly the same size as a mouse or rat brain) 70x20m wide, with 100 recording sites per mm. The probe automatically transforms the electrical signals it detects into digital data ready for computational analysis. Researchers at UCL have developed new data analysis methods to transform that data into meaningful information about the activity of individual brain cells. Timothy Harris, senior fellow at HHMI's Janelia Research Campus and leader of the Neuropixels collaboration said "Every action and decision you take involves the interactions of millions of neurons spread across your brain. This new technology enables us to detect the activity of large numbers of neurons from multiple brain regions with much less difficulty. I believe they will be transformational and will greatly accelerate the pace of neuroscience research" Matteo Carandini, Wellcome Investigator and neuroscientist at UCL, said "To understand the brain we need to understand how a lot of neurons spread all over the brain work together. Until recently, it was possible to measure the activity of individual neurons within a specific spot in the brain or to reveal larger, regional patterns of activity--but not to do both at the same time. These probes are a game changer. If you place them appropriately, you can really study how different parts of the brain work together at the neuronal level." Andrew Welchman, Wellcome's Head of Neuroscience and Mental Health, said "This is a significant step on the path to understanding how the brain works. The history of computing shows how small silicon circuits can revolutionise how we tackle hard problems. To give a basic analogy, these probes move us from the era of small black and white TV sets, to large, high-resolution flat screen displays. Neuropixel probes will change what we know and even how we think about the brain. We still have a long way to go in uncovering the brain's mysteries, but this new technology is an important development" In the Nature paper, researchers describe how the Neuropixels work. They explain how they used two Neuropixels probes to simultaneously record more than 700 well-isolated single neurons from five brain structures in a mouse. The researchers have also shown that the probes can be used in long-duration experiments with freely moving animals, in experiments with mice lasting up to 150 days. Long-term experiments enable researchers to study changes in the brain resulting from development, experience and learning, as well as the effects of neurodegenerative processes in disease. Scientists from the consortium will present data collected using prototype Neuropixels probes at the Annual Meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in Washington, DC, November 11-15, 2017. Neuropixels in action (Case Study) Researchers in the International Brain Laboratory have been working with the prototype Neuropixels probes and helping guide their development. The International Brain Lab brings together groups from UK, USA, France, Switzerland and Portugal to uncover how complex networks of brain cells support our ability to learn and make decisions. The different groups are working together to collectively understand a single behaviour in mice, a novel approach that will enable greater insight than any single lab could achieve alone. They will use Neuropixels probes to study many different areas in the brain of a mouse, as it forages for food. By pooling data from multiple labs, they can make measurements in all areas of the brain at a cellular level: simultaneously recording activity from 1,000 neurons in mice performing exactly the same task. The labs are then sharing their data in real time, enabling them to look at exactly what's happening in neurons distributed throughout an entire brain. ### The International Brain Lab is funded by the Simons Foundation and Wellcome. Notes to Editors Contact: Natalie Hodgson Media Manager E: n.hodgson@wellcome.ac.uk T: 020 7611 7290 / 07715633841 For embargoed access to the paper, please contact us. To provide a link for your readers, please use the following, which will go live at the time the embargo lifts: http://nature.com/articles/doi:10.1038/nature24636 Tuesday, November 7, 2017 Public transportation is a critical service for veterans across the country whether they are attending school, traveling to work, or going to a medical appointment. "We owe our veterans a profound debt of gratitude. While many public transit systems honor service members on Veterans Day, they also provide an important lifeline for veterans every day," said APTA Chair and Jacksonville Transportation Authority Chief Executive Officer, Nathaniel P. Ford, Sr. "Public transportation agencies work with veteran and community organizations on a regular basis to identify transportation solutions for veterans to get to and from VA hospitals and other locations." Metro Transit (Minneapolis, MN) has train and bus stops at the VA Medical Center. The light rail stop is named the VA Medical Center, since it is located nearby. One of Dallas Area Rapid Transit's (Dallas, TX) earliest rail stations is the VA Medical Center Station, which is located by the region's largest VA hospital. Tri Delta Transit (Antioch, CA) has a special brochure that identifies which bus goes to the VA hospital. This brochure is distributed locally to Veterans halls, Veteran Foreign Wars lodges, the VA Hospital, and local veterans organizations. The Stark Area Regional Transit Authority (Canton, OH) has a partnership with the Stark County Veterans Service Commission for the operation of a bus route that goes to the VA hospital in Cleveland. The service is free to veterans and their travel companion who are going to the VA hospital for medical appointments. Since 2013, more than 45,000 rides have been provided. "According to the recently released report by APTA, Public Transportation's Impact on Rural and Small Towns , there are 2.9 million veterans living in rural and small towns, making up 33 percent of the veteran population enrolled in the VA health care system," said Acting APTA President and CEO Richard A. White. "Public transit services help them access needed help and opportunities." Public transportation agencies partner with local veterans organizations to provide services to veterans year-round. Here are a few examples of partnerships that public transit agencies who serve rural veterans are doing. The Coast RTA (Conway, SC) partners with AARP's Veterans Stand-down, one of the largest Stand-down events in the southeast. By providing free rides to the Veterans Stand-down, individuals can go to a job fair and receive other services such as free haircuts, flu shots, legal advice, and clothing. Laketran (Painesville, OH) has a longstanding partnership with Lake County Veterans Service Commission and Lake County Commissioners to provide free Dial-a-Ride transportation to Lake County veterans to the veterans medical facilities and offices. Some public transit systems have generously donated vehicles to veteran organizations. The Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (San Jose, CA) has donated four of its community buses to the Homeless Veterans Emergency Housing Facility in San Jose. Spokane Transit (Spokane, WA) recently donated a van to the local Veterans' Administration to transport veterans with disabilities. Some public transit systems offer reduced or free fares for veterans year-round. Listen to the story of one veteran who was the recipient of free monthly bus passes, thanks to a partnership between the Monterey-Salinas Transit and the Veterans Transition Center of Monterey County. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJ5sqIdJZ7Q According to an informal survey conducted by APTA, the following systems offer reduced fare or free service to veterans: Capital District Transportation Authority (Albany, NY); Birmingham-Jefferson County Transit Authority (Birmingham, AL); Chicago Transit Authority (Chicago, IL); Pace Suburban Bus (Arlington Heights, IL); Metra (Chicago, IL); Antelope Valley Transit Authority (Lancaster, CA); Metro Transit (Minneapolis, MN); Monterey-Salinas Transit (Monterey, CA);New Jersey Transit (Newark, NJ); Gold Coast Transit (Oxnard, CA); Greater Peoria Mass Transit District (Peoria, IL); South Florida Regional Transportation Authority (Pompano Beach, FL); St. Cloud Metro Bus (St. Cloud, MN); Omnitrans (San Bernardino, CA); Hillsborough Area Regional Transit Authority (Tampa, FL). Veterans Day Activities On Veterans Day, many transit systems will honor veterans in their workforce and in their communities. Below is a sampling of activities that public transportation systems across the country are holding for Veterans Day to show their support for veterans. Free Rides: According to an informal survey conducted by APTA, some public transit systems are offering free fares for veterans on Veterans Day this year in the following communities: Golden Empire Transit (Bakersfield, CA); Birmingham-Jefferson County Transit Authority (Birmingham, AL); Stark Area Regional Transit (Canton, OH); Central Ohio Transit Authority (Columbus, OH); The Coast RTA (Conway, SC); TransIT? Services of Frederick County (Frederick, MD); Antelope Valley Transit Authority (Lancaster, CA); Capital Area Transportation Authority (Lansing, MI); Denton County Transportation Authority (Lewisville, TX); Memphis Area Transit Authority (Memphis, TN); Mountain Line Transit Authority (Morgantown, WV); Gold Coast Transit (Oxnard, CA); Greater Peoria Mass Transit District (Peoria, IL); Regional Transportation Commission of Washoe County (Reno, NV); Pinellas Suncoast Transit Authority (St. Petersburg, FL);Omnitrans (San Bernardino, CA); Pinellas Suncoast Transit Authority (St. Petersburg, FL); San Joaquin Transit District (Stockton, CA); Hillsborough Area Regional Transit Authority (Tampa, FL); C-TRAN (Vancouver, WA). The states of Rhode Island and Delaware are also providing free rides for their statewide service. Recognition For Employees That Are Veterans: Some public transit systems are hosting a Veterans Day luncheon for their employees. Jacksonville Transportation Authority (Jacksonville, FL) is doing a number of activities to recognize employees who served in the military, including creating a video of employees that will be shared on social media platforms and inviting some veteran employees to the JAX Chamber Military Appreciation Luncheon. LA Metro (Los Angeles, CA), Regional Transportation District (Denver, CO) and Capital District Transportation Authority (Albany, NY) will have luncheons for employees that have served in the military. The Central Ohio Transit Authority (Columbus, OH) will host a recognition ceremony for all employees who are veterans. Afterwards, the veterans will walk in the Columbus Veterans Day Parade with a specially wrapped bus. Likewise, Dallas Area Rapid Transit (Dallas, TX) will march in the Dallas Veterans Parade, one of the nation's largest veterans parades, alongside a DART bus. Wednesday, November 8, 2017 Got questions about funeral planning or cremation, but uncomfortable going to a funeral home before you have to? Watch this panel discussion with New Mexico funeral directors fielding your queries on everything related to undertaking. Topics included alkaline hydrolysis, rental caskets, how to get a free cremation, national cemetery burial for veterans and spouses, and much more! This panel discussion, the first event in the inaugural Before I Die ABQ Festival, took place at Albuquerque Oasis and was recorded October 20, 2017. The funeral director panel participants, seated left to right, are: Terence Shotkoski, Managing Partner, Berardinelli Funeral Home, Santa Fe, NM (www.BerardinelliFuneralHome.com) Jonathan Buck Dyck, Location Managing Director, French Funerals & Cremations, Albuquerque, NM (www.FrenchFunerals.com) David Slaten, Funeral Director, The Neptune Society, Albuquerque, NM (www.neptunesociety.com/location/albuquerque-cremation) Panel moderator: Gail Rubin, Certified Thanatologist, speaker, author, and coordinator of the Before I Die ABQ Festival (www.AGoodGoodbye.com) The discussion lasted for one hour and twenty minutes. [embedded content] Many thanks to the sponsors of the Before I Die ABQ Festival: Share this: Wednesday, November 8, 2017 CommPRO Editorial Staff The Annual International Womens Entrepreneurship Day [WED] convenes at the United Nations in New York City on Friday, November 17th, 2017 to empower women and girls globally to help alleviate poverty. The grassroots mission and message to empower women and girls to become active participants in the economy by igniting a network of women leaders, innovators, and entrepreneurs to initiate startups, drive economic expansion, and advance communities around the world. In order to achieve this ambitious goal, WED builds and catalyzes the vital networks of like-minded individuals and organizations that women business leaders need to realize their full potential and change the world. Historically, women worldwide have been underpaid, undervalued, underrepresented, underfunded and underestimated. We are dedicated, determined and driven to change this global imbalances, stated Wendy Diamond, Founder of the Womens Entrepreneurship Day. WED convenes Business Leaders, Government Officials and Civil society in 144 countries & 100 Universities to collaborate and find solutions in critical areas of entrepreneurship eco-systems, education and policy creation to empower women in business worldwide. Since this campaign launched in 2013, WED has helped women around the world in various ways: In Jordan, the group funded 500 Syrian refugee girls so they could attend high school. In Oman, they launched an initiative to empower women and girls to vote against arranged marriage. And in Uruguay, a partnership with a local university offered scholarships to the girls. Looking ahead, WED will be announcing the following goals on November 17th: Launch of the #ChooseWOMEN global platform, the largest directory of women-owned businesses in the world, allowing anyone, anywhere, to easily find and support women-owned businesses Support 1000 impoverished women through microloans to start their own businesses Expanded initiatives in Asia (New Delhi, Bangalore and Mumbai) and the Middle East (Yemen and Morocco) Diamond was inspired to launch WED and the movement after spending time in the Honduras with the Adelante Foundation, a group which provides microcredit to locally impoverished women. I saw first-hand how these start-up loans could change a womans life, and her familys, by investing in her future and providing the opportunity for her children to attend school, said Diamond. #ChooseWOMEN WED will launch the #ChooseWOMEN initiative on November 29th, 2017, a global social media initiative inspiring women and men to pledge their support to women in business. Firefighters have responded to a blaze which engulfed 70 tonnes of baled straw at a Nottinghamshire farm overnight. Firefighters were called to the well-developed flames in Kirton Road, Egmanton, a small village near Tuxford, at 2.19am in the early hours of Wednesday morning (November 8). A statement released by Tuxford fire station crew said: "This was approximately 70 tonnes of baled straw well alight with a farm trailer that was severely damaged by fire. "The farmer used machinery to move some of the affected bales to reduce the risk of spreading to neighbouring hedges while crews used a reel to damp down the surrounding undergrowth." A spokesman for Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service said the incident is ongoing. It is not yet known if the fire was started deliberately. He told the Nottingham Post: "Although we don't have any appliances there at the minute, we are going back later to check it." Increased farm fires A sharp rise in farm fires has prompted a rural insurer to call for farmers to check their fire prevention and evacuation procedures. This week alone, fire crews from across Cheshire spent several hours tackling a blaze caused by an electrical fault on a farm near Chester. Police are investigating into the possibility of arson at a Staffordshire farm after 300 tonnes of wood chip were set alight on Saturday (4 November). Firefighters battled a huge fire on a Scottish farm where more than 700 hay bales were caught alight in October, and in September, hundreds of tonnes of straw were set on fire at a farm in Cambridgeshire. A blaze that torched more than 150,000 worth of straw in a suspected arson attack in Nottinghamshire was described as one of the largest ever in the UK. A farm community charity is calling on the public to back their project in a national campaign to raise more funds. Ouseburn Farm Charity in Byker, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, is a community farm offering experience in the heart of Newcastles deprived urban East End. It is amongst hundreds of community-based projects that have been shortlisted in the Aviva Community Fund, which will fund the projects to support those most disadvantaged in the community. The Aviva Community Fund will finance over 500 projects across four different fund levels and four categories, giving awards to communities throughout the UK. Ouseburn Farm Charity has applied for up to 5,000 funding towards its Growing Together project, which will use food as a catalyst to bring groups of people together, to support their development and life skills. It seeks to educate vulnerable people from urban areas on growing and harvesting crops, encouraging physical activity and understanding the origins of food. Only 72 projects will be selected nationally to receive funding in the 1,000 to 5,000 category, following a public vote. The charity said: "Aviva investment will fund a much-needed project to support those most disadvantaged in the community; vulnerable adults, those with learning disabilities, and local people with complex and specialist support needs, including mental health problems. "Links with Tyne Housing, a specialist supported accommodation provider, will help us reach tenants and residents who will benefit. These groups suffer from poorer health than the general population, and often lead chaotic lives; many feel and are excluded from mainstream society." A cow which was "stolen" and destroyed by government officials due to a suspected case of bovine TB did not have the disease, the farmer has said. Farming couple Hilary and Trevor Ogden, from Stroud in Gloucestershire, told the BBC they returned home to their farm to find an open gate had been dismantled. Government officials had forced their way into the farm to take a cow suspected of having bovine TB. It has now been confirmed that the cow did not have the disease. The government has described such interventions as being "very rare", and compensation is paid in the loss of any livestock. The couple said their cow had been tested twice during the summer and was cleared by the vet. However, Mrs Ogden claimed she was followed when out shopping "so they would know when we were at home and when we weren't". "You're treated as if you're drug dealers or terrorists... that's what they do with people like that," she told the BBC. A Defra spokesperson said: "Despite the distress and devastation caused by needing to remove cattle as reactors, the vast majority of livestock keepers cooperate with the government's policy to eradicate bovine TB from the national herd. "All such owners are contacted in person by APHA (Animal and Plant Health Agency) and the reasons for reactor removal and arrangements for their removal are explained in full and compensation is paid for the loss of each reactor." The fate of the worlds most widely-used weed killer - an issue which has pitted Europes farming sector against green activists - is expected to come to a head tomorrow. The issue of whether or not to renew glyphosate has been seen as one of the most intensely political policy debates outside of Brexit. The meeting by the Standing Committee on Plants, Animals, Food and Feed (SCoPAFF) on Thursday (9 November) at the European Commission follows an initial round of votes by Member States that commenced on October 25, which failed to come to a conclusion. Following years of research and repeated delays, a decision is expected about whether to renew the license that allows the use of glyphosate within the EU. Glyphosate has been widely used by UK farmers for weed control over the past 40 years in place of intensive manual weeding. A report by Oxford Economics, with agricultural specialists the Andersons Centre, found that a glyphosate ban could cost British farmers almost 1billion. It found that a ban could lead to a reduction in farm output of 940 million and reduce the contribution of agriculture to UK GDP by 930 million a year. In France, a ban could mean a 930 million cut to its GDP and a 969m GDP reduction in Spain. Safe for consumers The EUs own European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) and European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), along other national regulatory agencies, including Germanys BfR, have all found glyphosate to be safe for consumers. Yet the French, German and Italian governments are reportedly against a renewal. Despite the government's who are against the renewal, farm groups across the EU are threatening to sue the European Commission if it fails to decide on a vote to grant glyphosate a new licence. Nevertheless, the situation will come to a head in tomorrow in Brussels, when the European Commissions Standing Committee on Plants, Animals, Food and Feed (SCoPAFF) will meet to decide the fate of British farming. A number of member states, who have long argued for science-based decisions, are now understood to be indicating they will not accept any further dilution of the Commissions current five-year renewal proposal. These states are believed to include Romania, Ireland, UK, Poland and Spain. This means that a failure to accept the Commissions latest proposal could lead to deadlock at tomorrow's meeting, with the French demanding further moves on an already severely watered down renewal proposal, and a larger group who believe that a five year renewal is already inadequate and are refusing to brook any more changes. Joint plea UK farming unions are waiting nervously for an outcome. They have produced a joint letter advocating the re-authorisation of glyphosate ahead of the meeting tomorrow. It was sent to the President of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, the Agriculture and Rural Development Commissioner, Phil Hogan, and the Health and Safety Commissioner, Vytenis Andriukaitis. An excerpt from the letter says: "Across the UK, farmers are following the ongoing debate on the re-approval of glyphosate with mounting concern. "The UK farming unions firmly believe that the EUs science-based decision making process should be upheld and glyphosate reauthorised for the maximum period possible. "Both the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) have concluded that glyphosate cannot be considered carcinogenic and therefore there should be no safety concerns related to its reauthorisation for the maximum period of 15 years. "The UK Farming Unions ask you to stand by your own science and regulatory procedure, and reauthorise glyphosate for the maximum period possible and not allow the issue to be politicised any longer. Not delivering would jeopardise confidence in the whole EU food safety system and in particular in EFSAs role." 'Clearly numbered' The Soil Association is one organisation which campaigns against glyphosate renewal. The environmental charity called its days as "clearly numbered". Laura MacKenzie, Soil Association Head of Policy, said: Whilst we wait for new Commission proposals, the UK Government should immediately ban spraying glyphosate in public places such as playgrounds and parks, and on food crops prior to harvest. Not all farmers use glyphosate - it has never been permitted in organic agriculture, and an increasing number of non-organic farmers are exploring alternative methods of managing weeds. This is partly due to recent research suggesting glyphosate could be causing significant harm to soil health and fertility. We need to build on the excellent work being done by farmers and researchers to develop alternatives to glyphosate so that farm businesses can continue to thrive if a decision is reached by EU countries to phase-out its use, whether on grounds of human health risks or environmental harm. A farmer who protected his sheep from a dog attack has been fined by the police for "breach of the peace". Jonathan Sloan, who farms in Springbank Farm near Kinross, was hit with a 40 fine simply for trying to rescue his flock of sheep from the dog. The 28-year-old's neighbours told him that his flock of 60 black-faced sheep was under attack by the "out of control" dog. The owner of the dog failed to stop the animal from attacking the livestock. Mr Sloan eventually put the situation under control by hitting the dog with his shepherd's crook to help it move away. The dog was eventually contained. The farmer then called the police after a heated argument with the dog owner, who became aggressive. But after speaking with police officers, Mr Sloan ended up with a 40 fine. No action was taken against the dog owner, despite the fact that livestock worrying is illegal. Farmers are legally entitled to shoot dogs which are out-of-control and pose a threat to livestock. Nevertheless, Mr Sloan was fined for "breach of the peace" due to "threatening behaviour". Month-long campaign The incident follows news of a month-long campaign launched by Police Scotland to raise awareness among dog owners about the devastating effects of livestock worrying. It coincides with a rise in sheep attacks by dogs during November, a time when sheep are brought down to low lying pasture, in areas more accessible by walkers. Police Scotland has said farmers and those who use the countryside are urged to report all incidents of livestock worrying to police on 101 or 999 in an emergency. But the news of Mr Sloan facing a fine and the dog owner getting away with the livestock offence will undoubtedly make farmers feel defenceless. A Police Scotland spokesman said: Police were called to Springfield Farm in Kinross on Tuesday (7 November) to a sheep worrying incident, which resulted in a dispute involving a farmer and dog owners. A 28-year-old man was issued with a 40 fine for threatening and abusive behaviour. Mr Sloan is now taking legal advice from NFU Scotland before he decides whether to pay the fine or not. An independent review looking at the allocation of CAP farm subsidies in the UK is to be held after a widening rift between devolved nations over which administration gets what. Scotland's Rural Economy minister Fergus Ewing accused the Treasury of a "great rural robbery" of 160m in funds, which he says "rightly belongs" to Scotland. Mr Ewing met Defra Secretary Michael Gove on Monday (6 November) and agreed to an independent review, with the details to be decided by the end of the year. Even Scottish Tory MP Alister Jack wrote to Defra Secretary Michael Gove asking him to review the "convergence uplift" and assess how the UK government can ensure Scottish farmers receive a fair settlement. The UK qualified for additional funds for farmers from the EU back in 2013 as a "gesture of goodwill", because of the low area payments made to Scottish farmers under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). But in 2013, Westminster decided to distribute the funds throughout England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland, rather than solely target it in Scotland. The Scottish government contends that England, Wales and Northern Ireland were all above the qualifying threshold of 90% of the EU average, but Scotland sitting at 45% meant the UK was eligible for a 190m "convergence uplift" in funding. After the meeting with Mr Gove, Mr Ewing explained that he was "pleased that we reached agreement on a way forward on this longstanding issue". However, he warned that while "much-needed progress" had been made, a resolution was still "some way off". A senior business representative to President Donald Trump has warned that the British public may have to accept chlorinated chicken as part of any trade deal between the UK and the US. Wilbur Ross, the US commerce secretary, said any trade deal between the two countries would need to scrap rules that were set by Brussels. Mr Ross, speaking at the Confederation of British Industry annual conference in London on Monday (6 November), said European regulations governing the safety of imports such as chlorine-washed chicken ignored US scientific research. He said changing these regulations will form a critical component of any trade discussion, and urged the UK to take measures to remove unnecessary regulatory divergences with the US. He warned that the close relationship the UK and US enjoy may be strained if the UK doesn't get rid of the EU's laws on food safety. Mr Ross also said it was important for the UKs deal to leave the EU to take into account Americas commercial interests. He said that Trump was very supportive of a trade deal between London and Washington. Indeed, Trump has said he wants US agriculture to have more access to British markets after the UK leaves the EU. He has previously criticised the EU's trading relationship with the US on food products. He said American farmers "can't deal" with the EU as they are "very, very protectionist." Food safety standards However, Wilbur Ross explained that the UK would need to change rules in areas such as food safety, a move which many British farmers do not welcome. He also said Geographic Indicators on food products, such as Gloucester Old Spot and Stilton cheese, is a key impediment to expanded trade. The comments are likely to pour more fuel on the fire ignited by Trade Secretary Liam Fox, who has previously said allowing chlorinated chicken into the UK should be part of a trade deal with the US. But despite assurances to the British public and farmers from Defra Secretary Michael Gove, Mr Fox has recently said there are "no health reasons" why British consumers could not eat chlorinated poultry. He added that most salads in our supermarkets are washed in chlorinated water already. Farmers have a big concern with allowing lower-standard chlorinated chicken to be imported into the UK, effectively undercutting home produce made to higher standards. In the US, the government permits such practices as chlorinated chicken, which consists of dipping meat into chlorinated water to prevent microbial contamination. Indeed, a report warned of the potential increase in cheaper, lower standard food imports to the UK which could put British farmers at a competitive disadvantage. Trade with America US trade representatives and industry experts are due to hold a second round of preliminary scoping discussions in London next week, after the first meetings in Washington in July. Mr Ross explained: As the UK stands on the edge of the major changes coming with Brexit, we stand ready to use this opportunity to support our friends across the pond and to deepen our ties even further. US Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue arrived in the UK in October to meet with Michael Gove and the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee (EFRA) to talk farm trade. Mr Perdue said it is too early to go into too much detail on future trade potential, but he added British lamb could be a big winner for American consumers. We think probably the UK is ahead of us in lamb and sheep production. There is big demand to have access to the U.S. market in those products, he said. Solar must go on rooftops instead of farmland, charity says Mahira Was Completely Broken She was quoted as saying, "I'd be lying if I said that I decided right off the bat that I wouldn't respond to this controversy. And I'm a very strong woman but when all of this happened, I was completely shattered and broken." She Had So Much To Say But... "I would think about posting a statement every day. Then I would stop myself because I just wouldn't know what to say," added the 'Raees' actress. It Wasn't Hate Mahira said, "Thankfully, Power Di Game' was ready to be released, which I thought was perfect timing, so I just posted that as sort of a response to the trolls. But to be honest, I understand where all the criticism came from and it didn't come from a place of hate." She Won't Mind Apologizing "I'm not talking about the trolls but those who were genuinely disappointed to see those pictures. It's the same disappointment that my nani or my mamoo would have felt seeing that. So even now when I meet an older lady who says that she didn't like the pictures, I'm quick to apologize," she says. Mahira Admits She Isn't The Perfect Role Model Mahira further added, "People ask me if I'm a good role model for my fans, and my response to that is that yes, I am a role model but I'm not the perfect role model. I am human, I make mistakes. And I was really happy to see that there were so many people who stood up for me. It goes to show that the narrative in Pakistan is changing, and if nothing else, I'm happy to have been part of that narrative." When Ranbir Spoke In Her Defence The actor had issued a statement that read, "I've gotten to know Mahira in a personal capacity over the last few months. She is somebody who I admire and respect, for her achievements and even more for the person she is. It is very unfair the way she is being judged and spoken about." Benafsha Pulls Akash Dadlanis Hair! The fight got so much intense that other contestants couldn't control them. Puneesh even went on to attack Priyank. But, Ben lost her cool and pulled Akash's hair. Benafsha PUNISHED! As per Bigg Boss' rule, no matter what, physical violence is not tolerated. Hence, Ben was punished. Not only was she sent to jail, she also got nominated for eviction. Did Akash Really Make Nasty Comments On Ben? There are also reports that Akash didn't make nasty comments on Ben. She said this to get footage! Puneesh Breaks The Rule! On the other hand, during the luxury budget task, the captain, Puneesh, who was also the supervisor, didn't follow the rule! Instead of keeping a watch on the contestants, he went to sleep and was also seen romancing Bandgi Kalra. Hina Breaks The Rule! During the task, before Puneesh came, Hina convinced the rest of the contestants to leave the rocket! But, along with Hina, other contestants had to pay for their mistake. Who Stayed In The Rocket Till The End? The contestant who remained in the rocket till the end were - Priyank Sharma, Benafsha Soonawala, Sapna Choudhary, Vikas Gupta, Hina Khan and Hiten Tejwani. Hina Guilty! Bigg Boss announced that the luxury budget task was cancelled as the contestants didn't follow the rules. Bigg Boss also said that the prize money was slashed to zero. Hina blamed Puneesh for not following the rule. She was also guilty as she felt she was the reason for the loss. Hina & Hiten Jailed! This is not all, Bigg Boss asked the contestants to name two contestants who performed worst. According to report, the housemates chose Hina Khan and Hiten Tejwani as the worst performers of the week. Hina and Hiten would be joining Ben in the jail (Kalkotri). Arshi & Priyank Fight Meanwhile, we hear that Arshi Khan and Priyank Sharma would also get into fight. Apparently, Arshi loses her cool over Priyank's girly taunts and threatens him! Arshi Threatens Priyank Arshi tells Priyank that she knows where he resides in Malad, Mumbai. She continues to say that when she is out of the Bigg Boss house, she will show him what she can do. She also says that the area he resides is hers and will not spare him! Arshi & Priyank Arshi and Priyank have not been in good terms. It has to be recalled that after Priyank came back to the house, he brought in Arshi's past and made her cry. Arshi's publicist has also filed FIR against him (Sapna, Colors and Endemol). What happened? Shares of Royal Caribbean Cruises (RCL 4.50%), one of the world's largest cruise companies operating more than six brands in the cruise vacation industry, jumped more than 5% by 9:40AM EST after the company announced its mixed third-quarter results. So what The well-known cruise operator posted mixed results as its top-line revenue fell short of estimates, but its bottom-line earnings managed to top estimates. Royal Caribbean posted revenue of $2.57 billion during the third-quarter, which fell just shy of analysts' estimates calling for $2.58 billion. The cruise operator managed to post earnings per share of $3.49 despite the revenue shortfall, which topped analysts' estimates of $3.43 per share. Royal Caribbean's recent success can partly be attributed to the company's Double-Double program which was set to double the company's 2014 earnings per share by 2017 and increase return on invested capital (ROIC) to double digits. "We are only weeks away from crossing the finish line of our Double-Double program and I want to thank all of our employees for their remarkable efforts," said Richard D. Fain, chairman and CEO, in a press release. "The recent storms presented extraordinary challenges and I am extremely proud of the generosity, strength of character and sense of social responsibility displayed by our employees and the industry as a whole." Now what In the short-term, management expects fourth-quarter adjusted earnings-per-share to check in between $1.15 to $1.20, which is slightly lower than analysts' estimates calling for $1.26 per share. But the year-to-date 55% run-up in share price, and even more over the past five years, emphasizes investors are buying into the long term and, looking ahead, management intends to do much of the same. Its 20/20 Vision strategy is focused on building modest dividend yield growth, strong cost control, and capacity growth over the long-term. The stock market had a relatively quiet day on Tuesday, leaving major benchmarks little changed from yesterday's close. After initial optimism about the prospects for tax reform, investors seem to now grasp the challenge in getting legislation through Congress quickly enough to implement changes for the 2018 tax year. Many believe that the strong performance in stocks in 2017 has hinged on eventual reductions in the corporate tax rate, and if tax reform grows less certain, markets could see their volatility levels increase. Yet several individual companies enjoyed good news that lifted their shares, and Valeant Pharmaceuticals International (BHC 0.56%), Denbury Resources (DNR), and Kindred Healthcare (KND) were among the best performers on the day. Below, we'll look more closely at these stocks to tell you why they did so well. Valeant bounces back Shares of Valeant Pharmaceuticals International jumped 17% after the controversial drug manufacturer posted its third-quarter financial report. Revenue for the company was down more than 10% from year-earlier figures, but it managed to earn a profit thanks to a one-time tax benefit. Even though Valeant suffered from issues like the loss of patent exclusivity on some of its treatments, growth in areas like its Bausch + Lomb business and its Salix drug unit helped to bolster confidence about the overall company's future. Valeant still has a lot of work to do, and continuing to cut its debt and find ways to bolster sales and profits will be priorities going forward. Still, Valeant made enough progress to satisfy shareholders for the time being. Denbury powers up Denbury Resources stock rose more than 7% in the wake of the company's third-quarter financial report. The oil exploration and production company boosted its revenue and adjusted net income from the year-earlier period, taking advantage of more favorable conditions in the oil patch. Denbury CEO Chris Kendall celebrated the high-quality assets that the company has, and even with negative impacts from Hurricane Harvey, Denbury managed to keep production levels up. With oil prices having moved higher recently, the energy company is optimistic about its ability to boost production further while keeping costs under control to maximize overall profit. Kindred stays upbeat despite losses Finally, shares of Kindred Healthcare soared 40%. The healthcare services provider's third-quarter results included a net loss for the quarter and substantial declines in revenue, but investors instead seemed to focus on the progress that Kindred has made toward making major strategic moves. CEO Benjamin Breier said that efforts to exit the skilled nursing facility business and mitigate negative impacts from its long-term acute care unit are starting to pay off. Kindred cited the hurricanes that hit Texas and Florida as contributing factors to the declines in financial results, but investors were pleased that the healthcare company has been able to hold up as well as it has while taking big steps toward optimizing its business opportunities in the years to come. Smart ATMs to replace the existing Indian ATM machines News oi -Rohit The multi-function ATMs will have innovative features like face recognition and biometrics The existing ATM machines in your locality are soon going to get a complete makeover. The old ATM machines will be replaced by new smart machines which will come equipped with smart features like face recognition and biometrics. These sophisticated machines will facilitate customers in transferring money and depositing cash and cheques. But what truly makes them smart is the fact that these machines will not run out of money as the cash deposited by customers will be dispensed. As per an IANS report, banks in India are likely to replace the existing ATMs with more innovative and multi-function machines in the next three to four months. The news was shared by an official of NCR Corporation, a global leader in omni-channel solutions. NCR has a 50 percent ATM market share in India, and has come out with innovations like Interactive Teller ATM and EMV contactless ATM from its research and development centre in Hyderabad. As per a report by The Hindu, NCR Corporation has opened a 140,000 sq ft R&D facility in Hyderabad, the largest for the consumer transaction technology firm outside of the US. The company is planning to invest more on software solutions to shape it into a profit engine and to make cash transactions easy for Indian citizens. As noted, the existing ATMs we have today were deployed 8 to 10 years ago. With the new smart ATMS, these old machines will be moved to tier II and tier III cities. The IANS report further suggests that the ATM market in the country has gone down in the country post demonetization. However, the market would pick up pace in the coming quarter, NCR Corporation which bagged a Rs 334-crore order from SBIBSE -0.69 % to install over 7,000 cash-vending machines, believes that with the replacement of existing ATMs, the market would return to 9 percent annual growth rate as the progression to cashless economy will be slow. 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 Apple accused of copying patented camera technology for iPhone 7 Plus and iPhone 8 Plus News oi -Samden Sherpa Tel Aviv-based Corephotonics filed its patent infringement case against Apple in federal court in San Jose, California, on Monday. An Israeli based startup Corephotonics has now sued Apple alleging that the iPhone 7 Plus and iPhone 8 Plus smartphones infringe upon four of its patents related to dual-camera technology. The startup has filed its patent infringement case against Apple in a federal court in San Jose, California, which is also the headquarters of Apple. Corephotonics, which has raised $50 million from several high-profile venture capital firms and other investors, said its patented dual camera technology for mobile devices was incorporated by Apple in the iPhone 7 Plus and iPhone 8 Plus without its authorization. Basically, the company has accused that the two Apple iPhone models copied its patented telephoto lens design, optical zoom method and a method for intelligently fusing images from the wide-angle and telephoto lenses to improve image quality. Newly-launched "super-premium" iPhone X also has a dual-camera system but is said to be not a part of the lawsuit as of now. Apple Declined to Enter into a Partnership According to reports, Corephotonics Chief Executive David Mendlovic had approached Apple about a possible partnership. However, Apple allegedly praised the technology but refused a license. Further, Apple's lead negotiator expressed contempt for Corephotonics' patents, telling Dr. Mendlovic and others that even if Apple infringed, it would take years and millions of dollars in litigation before Apple might have to pay something. Apple has not given any statement regarding the case. While the company is yet to respond to the suit or issue a public comment, it was at Mobile World Congress (MWC) in 2016, Corephotonics displayed its dual-camera technologies. Founded in 2012, Corephotonics which is led by Tel Aviv University Professor David Mendlovic calls itself a pioneer in the field of dual-camera technologies for smartphones. In 2015, Apple had acquired another Israeli camera company called LinX Imaging that also specializes in creating multi-aperture camera equipment for mobile devices. Meanwhile, through its latest funding round in January, Corephotonics raised $15 million from investors that included Samsung Ventures, electronics manufacturer Foxconn and chipmaker MediaTek. Amidst all these, now it will be interesting to see where this battle will go between the two companies. This is not the first time for Apple as it is also engaged in a lawsuit with Qualcomm already. Seems like the company has one more obstacle in its path. In any case, Corephotonics will be represented by Quinn Emanuel Urquhart and Sullivan, the law firm that advised Samsung Electronics on its patent litigation with Apple. 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 Moto X4 will be a Flipkart exclusive when it launches on November 13 in India News oi -Samden Sherpa Flipkart has also set up a dedicated page for the upcoming Moto X4. Lenovo's sub-brand Motorola has already confirmed that the Moto X4 is coming to India on November 13 in the market. While a new launch is always exciting, it seems that the new smartphone will now be a Flipkart exclusive. Flipkart is India's largest e-commerce marketplace and the company has now announced that Motorola's latest offering in the Moto X franchise - the Moto X4 will be exclusively available on their platform. The e-commerce portal has even set up a dedicated page for the Moto X4. Besides, we are also hoping to see some launch offers being announced during the launch event of the upcoming Moto X4. But again buoyed by the successful launches of previous generations of Moto X, Flipkart is excited to partner again with Motorola to launch another key product in their smartphone portfolio. Flipkart has already started posting a series of teasers on social media that hinted that the Moto X is as beautiful as it is strong. However, more details on other specifications and the price of the Moto X will be revealed on 13th November as well. Gear up to experience perfection with #MotoX4, a phone as beautiful as it's strong! Arriving on 13/11, on @Flipkart. https://t.co/I6rC1RlCWq pic.twitter.com/gFHzc9cdrF Motorola India (@motorolaindia) November 7, 2017 Commenting on the exclusive partnership, Ayyappan Rajagopal, Senior Director - Smartphones at Flipkart, said, "Flipkart's partnership with Motorola is set to achieve new heights with the exclusive launch of the Moto X. Motorola phones have always ticked the right boxes and greatly appealed to our large and growing customer base with their design and performance." He added, "The new exclusive launch will set new benchmarks and expand shoppers' choice of phones, reinforcing our stronghold in the Indian market by increasing aspirations and setting new expectations for customers who are on the constant look-out for the best offerings within their budget." Meanwhile, the Moto X4 was previously unveiled at IFA 2017 and we already have some idea about the device. But Motorola might have some surprise up its sleeve. We will get to know it soon. Having said that, just to recall Moto X4 comes with a 5.2-inch full-HD LTPS IPS display with 424ppi pixel density and Corning Gorilla Glass protection, 2.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 630 octa-core SoC, 3GB of RAM, Android 7.1 Nougat, 3000mAh battery, and both Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa are integrated with the phone. Moto X4 comes with a dual rear camera setup which comprises of 12-megapixel dual autofocus sensor with f/2.0 aperture and 1.4-micron pixels while the secondary one is an 8-megapixel ultra-wide angle sensor. Up front, there is a 16-megapixel selfie sensor with flash support. The handset has a metal unibody design and packs a fingerprint scanner embedded in the home button at the front. It is also equipped with a USB Type-C port and 3.5mm audio jack. 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 OnePlus announces three methods via which you can be a part of the OnePlus 5T launch event News oi -Samden Sherpa OnePlus is going to charge $40 fee for its 5T event, but it's all for a good cause. OnePlus is set to make its debut on November 16 at an event in Brooklyn, New York. The OnePlus 5T announcement event is going to be held under the title "A New View". However, most of the time the ones that get the first look at the device are usually journalists who are basically attending the launch events. Interestingly, apart from journalists, fans of the OnePlus brand will also be among the first ones to see the device. How? Well, OnePlus is selling out tickets for the event and fans will be able to buy it and attend the event personally. The ticket will cost $40 (roughly Rs. 2,606) and interested people can buy the ticket from the event page starting today. OnePlus will be donating the entry fee to charity though. While OnePlus is giving its fans a chance to see the new OnePlus 5T in person it could be that the spots are limited. The company hasn't confirmed how many seats will be available. If people want to watch it from the comforts of their home then OnePlus will be streaming the event live via its official launch page. As for people and fans in India, the company in a blog post has said, "Those of you joining us from India can watch the Launch live at select theaters or online on November 16 at 9:30 PM IST." This launch will be aired exclusively in 5 cities which include PVR ECX, Chanakyapuri, New Delhi, PVR Phoenix Market City, Viman Nagar, Pune, PVR Phoenix Market City, Lower Parel, Mumbai, PVR Forum, Kukatpally, Hyderabad, PVR Orion, Rajajinagar, Bangalore. Ticket booking starts on BookMyShow from 8th Nov 10:00 AM IST and there is some offer for the interested people. They will get popcorn and coke free as well as an exclusive OnePlus 2018 calendar worth Rs 799 and finally they will be the first to experience the OnePlus 5T at India's first theatre livestream launch. The company has also stated, "The OnePlus family has always had a big digital following. But that won't keep us from wanting to get closer to our fans in a more personal way. That's why we're inviting you to join the team for the official unveiling of the OnePlus 5T." Meanwhile, early birds in India will be able to get their device through a flash sale on November 21, while official sales start on November 28. 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 Panasonic Eluga I5 with 2GB RAM spotted on Flipkart at Rs. 6,499 News oi -Abhinaya Prabhu Panasonic seems to have come up with yet another smartphone. Earlier this week, Panasonic was in the headlines for the launch of a new smartphone called Eluga A4 at a price point of Rs. 12,490. Within a couple of days, it looks like the company has unveiled yet another smartphone called Eluga I5. We say so as a new device with the name Panasonic Eluga I5 has been spotted on the e-commerce portal Flipkart with the "Coming Soon" label. The listing shows that the smartphone will be available in two color variants - Black and Gold and the hashtag "OnlyOnFlipkart" gives us a hint that this smartphone will be exclusive to the online retailer. Also, the listing reveals that the Panasonic Eluga I5 will be priced at Rs. 6,499. Going by the Flipkart listing, the Panasonic Eluga I5 is said to feature a 5-inch HD 1280 x 720 pixel display. It is seen to be clad in a metal body with the 2.5D curved glass coating at the front that gives the device gentle curves towards the sides. The display features Asahi Dragontrail glass that renders clear and sharp pictures. The circular fingerprint sensor is positioned at the rear and the main camera is at the top left corner above the antenna line. The Eluga I5 has a sleek metal body as mentioned above and is listed to measure 7.5mm in thickness. In terms of hardware aspects, the Panasonic smartphone that we are talking is listed to employ a quad-core 1.25GHz MediaTek MTK6737 processor that is teamed up with 2GB RAM and 16GB storage capacity. The default memory space can be expanded further up to 128GB using a microSD card. Running on Android 7.0 Nougat out of the box, the Panasonic Eluga I5 is preloaded with the company's ARBO AI assistant. For imaging, there is a 13MP rear camera with f/2.2 aperture, LED flash and 5P lens. At the front, there is a 5MP selfie camera with a similar aperture. The connectivity aspects of the Panasonic smartphones in question include 4G VoLTE, Bluetooth, GPS and Wi-Fi. It is a dual SIM smartphone as many others in the market. The device will get the much-needed power from a 2500mAh battery that is non-removable. Best Mobiles in India Microsoft and KidZania join hands to ensure holistic cyber-physical safety of children News oi -Samden Sherpa Microsoft is developing the technology and tools, establishing partnerships, providing safety-related education and guidance, and conducting research into people's behaviors online. According to Dr. Jyoti Kapoor, Sr. Psychiatrist, Paras Hospitals, "As parents we need to be more attentive and alert about our child's surroundings both, in the cyber and physical worlds. We must watch out for behavioral change caused due to emotional or physical abuse, and we must adopt preventive measures. The most common warning signs of abuse in cyber as well as physical worlds manifest as signs of depression, anxiety, social isolation, nervousness and low self-esteem. Parents need to be very alert to read these signs and immediately take corrective measures. It is important that while we draw benefit from the immense potential of new technologies, we must also make use of all the security features available to make it a safe and pleasant experience." To that end, Microsoft and KidZania have joined hands with Dr. Kapoor to create awareness about good practices for holistic and collaborative cyber-physical safety of children. Besides, this partnership is a result of Microsoft and KidZania sharing a common philosophy. As such, Microsoft's mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. KidZania's vision is to ignite the hearts and minds of kids everywhere by empowering them to make the world a better place. Thus Microsoft and KidZania are now helping create protected cyber and physical spaces where children will be empowered to learn, be creative and achieve more. For this Microsoft is taking a three-pronged approach. They are developing the technology and tools, establishing partnerships, providing safety-related education and guidance, and conducting research into people's behaviors online. As a crucial first step, Microsoft is encouraging the use of Microsoft Family Safety features and Windows 10 Parental Controls that can safeguard children in the cyber world. Alok Lall, Partner Technology Lead, Microsoft India, believes, "The internet can be a wonderful educational tool as well a means of providing interactive and constructive leisure activities for children. However, most parents are rightly worried about some of the content their children may be exposed to on the web and want to keep them safe online. As a parent myself, I would encourage everyone to take advantage of the Microsoft Family features within Windows 10 to create a secure online environment." KidZania has been pioneers in creating safe and interactive indoor theme parks across the world including India. The essence of their child-centered, role-play and reality-based activities lies in the fact that they have safety in-built into their designs, developments, and operations. KidZania has led the way in adopting practices like RFID Security Bracelets for children, No Touch Policy, CCTV Camera Coverage without Blind Spots, No Unaccompanied Adults Allowed Policy and much more. Reiterating their commitment to being a safety leader, Viraj Jit Singh, Chief Marketing Officer, KidZania India, said, "KidZania has over 18 years of experience running safe and secure theme parks all over the world. Since inception in India, we have hosted more than 2.5 million visitors. While our safety measures are of international standards, there is a constant flow of learning through best practices from our 24 global centers. We constantly innovate and since technology plays an integral role in creating a safe and secure space for our visitors, we will reach out to partners who can help us explore the benefits of AI, IoT, cognitive services, and other Cloud-based services to provide seamless cyber-physical safety to our children." To protect children from inappropriate content and secure the system from malware, Windows 10 Fall Creators Update has introduced new features in the Windows Defender Security Center that provide easy access to and integration with Parental Controls. Microsoft Family also allows parents to insulate their children from inappropriate content strewn across the web. When parents add their child to the Microsoft Family and turn on activity reporting, they get weekly activity report emails that show a summary of their activity, including websites visited, games and apps used, terms searched for on search engines like Bing and how much screen time they had, even if they have logged in from a friend's house or any other screen. 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 signs MOU with Vodacom for 5G trial in South Africa News oi -Priyanka 5G portfolio that will allow operators to gain an early-to-market advantage in the delivery of ultra-fast mobile broadband services that leverage multi-Gigabit speeds and ultra-low latency. Finnish telecom gear maker Nokia and Vodacom have signed an MoU under which the companies will trial Nokia 5G technology to accelerate in South Africa. The launch of the new technology will enable Vodacom to drive digitalization for the benefit of businesses and individuals in South Africa. Nokia says that, it has a 5G portfolio that will allow operators to gain an early-to-market advantage in the delivery of ultra-fast mobile broadband services that leverage multi-Gigabit speeds and ultra-low latency. Andries Delport, Vodacom Group Chief Technology Officers commented: "As the leading mobile network provider in South Africa, with the best 3G and 4G networks, it was crucial for us to partner a formidable player such as Nokia as we're gearing ourselves for the next generation of wireless networks, 5G. This collaboration comes at a time when we have a firm mandate from the Vodacom Board to propel Vodacom Group to become a leading digital company." "It is my firm belief that the adoption of 5G will help us to deliver against some of the digital technologies in areas such as big data analytics, artificial intelligence, virtual and augmented reality, autonomous vehicles and the Internet of Things. Quite crucially, Africa is in the middle of a mobile connectivity boom, and as such, 5G will help us to deliver faster internet speeds to our almost 70 million customers across the Group," Delport. Initially the companies will focus on the delivery of Ultra-HD and virtual reality video services, leveraging the enhanced mobile broadband and ultra-low latency capabilities of 5G. Both the compnaies will also collaborate to understand how 5G can drive continued economic growth in vertical industries important to South Africa including manufacturing, mining, healthcare, media, energy and transportation. Nokia will leverage expertise from its Bell Labs Consulting arm to work with Vodacom and identify where, when and how to evolve its network to 5G. Rajen Naidoo, head of Vodacom South Africa Cutomer Team at Nokia, said: "We have defined a technology path that allows operators to transition to 5G at their own pace. Working with Vodacom, we can help it identify how 5G can support growth in the country and the steps it should take in its own transition to best meet individual subscriber and enterprise needs. 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 Vodafone announces new range of postpaid plans News oi -Priyanka The company is also providing inbuilt Free data quotas up to 200GB and a Data rollover feature that allows consumers to carry forward unused data. India's second largest telecom operator Vodafone has announced its new range of postpaid plans called RED Traveler, RED International and RED Signature. Under Vodafone, RED Traveler will get three plans of Rs. 499, Rs. 699, and Rs. 999, and under RED International, are getting Rs. 1,299, Rs. 1,699, and Rs. 1,999. And lastly, under RED Signature type, there are a single Rs. 2,999 postpaid plan. Avneesh Khosla, Associate Director said Consumer Business, Vodafone India, said, "We are delighted to announce the launch of our new Vodafone Post Paid RED plans that guarantee our consumers a host of unprecedented benefits. These plans have been structured to provide our customers with the best telecom & nontelecom benefits that cater to the ever-evolving needs of our customers." The company is also providing inbuilt Free data quotas up to 200GB and a Data rollover feature that allows consumers to carry forward unused data. Furthermore, consumers opting for RED International will enjoy Free ISD minutes to USA, Canada, China, Hong Kong, Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore. In addition, RED Traveler, RED International, and RED Signature - consumers will be able to bring together friends, family and devices under RED Together to get guaranteed savings up to 20 percent on total rentals and a host of other benefits. The new RED postpaid plans will be available to consumers on 8th November 2017. The new plans are presently not slated for launch in the following telecom circles - Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Jammu & Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh. Vodafone RED postpaid consumers will also get, other value-added benefits such as: - The gift of up to 12 months of Free NETFLIX - Free access to latest movies and live TV with Vodafone PLAY. - Access to over 4000 of the world's best magazines at their fingertips with the free subscription to MAGZTER. - Free access to RED SHIELD, a handset protection feature that protects consumers' handsets from theft and damage. 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 Estonia Arrests Russian Man Suspected Of Being FSB Agent November 07, 2017 Estonia has detained a man suspected of being a Russian agent operating against the Estonian state, the Prosecutor-General's Office says. The man, a Russian citizen, was suspected of plotting a computer-related crime, among other things, prosecutor Inna Ombler said on November 7. She said that Estonian state institutions were targeted but did not disclose details, adding that the suspect's detention last week means that "bigger damage was prevented." Ombler said the suspect was working for the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), the main successor to the Soviet-era KGB. The suspect, who was not identified, was formally charged in a Tallinn court on November 6. In 2015 and 2016, three men in Estonia were convicted of cooperating with Russian intelligence services and sentenced to prison. In May, Estonia expelled two Russian diplomats posted at Moscow's consulate in Narva over contacts with local officials that were considered inappropriate for diplomats. Government and private Internet sites in Estonia suffered major cyberattacks in 2007, following a decision by the Baltic nation to move a Soviet-era war memorial from a square in the capital. The small Baltic country has made cybersecurity a focus of its six-month EU presidency, which ends on December 31, following a series of global cyberattacks this year. Occupied by the Soviet Union during World War II, Estonia gained independence in the Soviet collapse of 1991 and is now a member of NATO and the European Union. Relations with Russia are severely strained. Based on reporting by Reuters and AP Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/estonia-russia-arrest- fsb-agent/28840223.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 General Cites Iraqi Forces' Confidence, Ability in Liberating Qaim By Terri Moon Cronk DoD News, Defense Media Activity WASHINGTON, Nov. 7, 2017 As the Iraqi flag flew over Qaim's border to boast the Iraqi town's liberation from the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, it signaled a milestone in the defeat of ISIS as a physical caliphate, a senior coalition officer told Pentagon reporters today. Speaking via teleconference from Irbil, Iraq, where he is temporarily commanding operations, Air Force Brig. Gen. Andrew A. Croft congratulated the Iraqi security forces on driving ISIS out of Irbil, and largely out of Iraq, over the weekend. Croft is Combined Joint Forces Land Component Command's deputy commanding general for air as part of Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve. "Over the past few months," Croft said, "we have seen the [Iraqi forces] increasing in confidence and ability as they have taken the fight to ISIS and allowed the Iraqi people to regain control of their own towns and cities." The U.S.-led global coalition has stood fully behind the fight to defeat ISIS, and its members are proud of their role in the win of the barbaric enemy and its false narrative, Croft said. Coalition Continues Support "We will continue our efforts until the threat is completely destroyed and no longer able to terrorize the people of Iraq," he said of the coalition. In Irbil, he added, "we are investing in the future by continuing our training mission to ensure that all Iraqis can be responsible for their own security." The U.S.-led coalition has a long-standing relationship with Kurdish peshmerga fighters and the Iraqi security forces, both of whom have fought in the recent offenses against ISIS, he said. And the support will continue to assist in making the continued negotiations take place between both parties as they seek to forge a new relationship in a post-ISIS era, Croft said. "As [the Iraqi security forces have] fought a hard ground battle," the general said, "I have been impressed by the capability and the effectiveness of the Iraqi air force and army aviation command throughout the campaign." Iraq's pilots have shown bravery as the Iraqi air force has come to maturity, he added. The coalition will provide surveillance, reconnaissance, precision air support and ground artillery, enabling the Iraqi forces' advance while taking great care to minimize civilian casualties in the process, Croft said. "As the [Iraqi forces are] pushing through the last areas of Anbar province, the coalition continues to assist the ground maneuver with intelligence-led precision strikes and close air support. In addition, we are supplying technical and logistical support to the battle," he added. 'More Work to Do "Our job here is not finished," the general said. "We as a coalition will continue to hunt ISIS and disrupt and destroy their operations. Iraq will be liberated and secured by Iraqis with the help of our united coalition." Croft noted that from an air perspective, the campaign to defeat ISIS in Iraq has been "the most precise, proportional air campaign that we have ever done." "And from Mosul to Tal Afar, through Hawija through the Anbar province," he continued, "the ability of the air component to support the [Iraqi security forces] is a real success story," he added. "It's been disciplined, professional, and very effective." The coalition is continuing its work to enable the Iraqis to conduct intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance operations on their own and assisting with their precision-strike capability, Croft said. "This is an enabler that will allow this country to defeat another enemy, whether it looks like ISIS or otherwise, in the future," he added. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Task Force Marauder conducts patient load training with Romanian Armed Forces By Capt. Jessica Donnelly November 7, 2017 AFGHANISTAN -- Task Force Marauder trained Soldiers with the Romanian Armed Forces on hot and cold-load procedures for a UH-60 Black Hawk, November 2017, in order to know how to safely load a patient in the event of a real-world emergency in Afghanistan where TF Marauder medevac responds. Soldiers with Detachment 1, C Company, Medical Evacuation, 2-211th General Support Aviation Battalion with the Iowa National Guard, currently deployed to Afghanistan, trained more than 150 Soldiers with the Romanian Land Forces over the course of a week on the proper procedures for calling for a medevac and loading a casualty. U.S. Army Capt. Erin Doyle, Det. 1, C Co., 2-211th GSAB commander, explained the training came as a result of a recent mass casualty attack where members of the previous task force's medevac unit responded and provided medical care and transportation for the Romanian Soldiers. The event showed the importance of the ground troops understanding the procedures for calling the medevac and how to approach the aircraft with a casualty. The training covered what information needs to be reported in order for the medevac to launch, what equipment and medical capabilities are available in the aircraft, preferences for signaling the aircraft for landing for both day and night, how to prepare and secure a patient before the helicopter arrives, and how to approach the aircraft and interact with the medic to give a patient report. Overall, the biggest aspect of the training was focusing on safety, added U.S. Army Staff Sgt. Justin Meier, Det. 1, C Co., 2-211th GSAB platoon sergeant. "Anyone can carry a litter up to an aircraft, so they need to know the safest way to do it," said Meier. Meier explained, in an emergency situation where there can be a lot of confusion, it is important for the ground troops to understand how to safely approach the aircraft so they don't get injured or further injure the patient. For that reason, the Romanian Soldiers loaded litters while the aircraft was running to practice taking directions from the aircrew. "It's been great to interact with Soldiers and unit that we are responsible for providing medical services to," said Doyle. "Many of them had not been near U.S. aircraft and enjoyed being able to ask questions." TF Marauder is made up of Soldiers from South Carolina National Guard, Illinois National Guard, Iowa National Guard, as well as active duty component and provides aviation capabilities with AH64 Apaches, UH60 Black Hawks, CH47 Chinooks, and MEDEVAC assets in Afghanistan under the 3rd Combat Aviation Brigade while deployed. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address U.S. Department of Defense Press Operations News Transcript Presenter: Brigadier General Andrew A. Croft, deputy commander, Air, Combined Joint Forces Land Component Commander-Operation Inherent Resolve November 07, 2017 Department of Defense Press Briefing by Brigadier General Croft via Teleconference From Erbil, Iraq STAFF: CJFLCC, this is OSD. Are you ready to go? Over. STAFF: Ready to go. How are you doing? STAFF: Great. We hear -- we hear you loud and clear. I will give -- deliver a brief intro, and then we'll turn it over to General Croft for an opening statement, and then go to question and answer. Here it goes. STAFF: You bet. Sure, no problem. STAFF: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Today, we're joined by Brigadier General Andrew A. Croft, who is the deputy commanding general, air, Combined Joint Forces Land Component Command-Operation Inherent Resolve, and the deputy director of the Joint Air Component Coordination Element, Combined Joint Task Force-Operation Inherent Resolve, Baghdad, Iraq. As the highest ranking Air Force officer in Iraq, General Croft ensures the integration and synchronization of Combined Joint -- combined forces air component assets in support of land component operations. In this assignment, General Croft coordinates directly with CJTF-OIR and its sub-components as the air component commander's representative. General Croft, we'll turn it over to you for an opening statement. Over. BRIGADIER GENERAL ANDREW A. CROFT: Okay. Thank you. A quick opening statement, if you will. Good morning, everyone. I'm Brigadier General Andrew Croft, the deputy commanding general for air, Combined Joint Forces Land Component Command-Operation Inherent Resolve. I'm speaking to you from Erbil, Iraq, where I'm temporarily commanding operations. Let me start by congratulating the Iraqi Security Forces on their recent successes as they drive ISIS out of Iraq. On Sunday, the prime minister raised the Iraqi flag on the border at Al-Qa'im, another milestone in the defeat of ISIS as a physical caliphate. Over the past few months, we have seen the Iraqi security forces increasing in confidence and ability as they have taken the fight to ISIS and allowed the Iraqi people to regain control of their own towns and cities. The global coalition has stood fully behind its fight, and we are proud of our role in the defeat of this barbaric enemy and its false narrative. We will continue our efforts until the threat is completely destroyed and no longer able to terrorize the people of Iraq. Here in Erbil, we are investing in the future by continuing our training mission to ensure that all Iraqis can be responsible for their own security. We have a longstanding relationship with the Peshmerga and the Iraqi security forces, both of whom have fought in the recent offenses against ISIS. We support and assist in facilitating the continued negotiations between both parties as they seek to forge a new relationship in the post-ISIS era. In my area of expertise, as a deputy commanding general for air, I am the primary coordinator of the coalition air campaign in Iraq. As Iraqi security forces have fought a hard ground battle, I have been impressed by the capability and effectiveness of the Iraqi air force and army aviation command throughout the campaign. Not only are we seeing the bravery of the pilots, but we are witnessing the air force come to maturity. The coalition's part in this is to provide surveillance, reconnaissance, precision air support and ground artillery, enabling the Iraqi security forces' advance while taking great care to minimize civilian casualties in the process. As the Iraqi Security Forces are pushing through the last areas of Anbar Province, the coalition continues to assist the ground maneuver with intelligence-led precision strikes and close air support. In addition, we are providing technical and logistical support to the battle. Our job here is not finished. We as a coalition will continue to hunt ISIS and disrupt and destroy their operations. Iraq will be liberated and secured by Iraqis, with the help of our united coalition. At this point, I'll be happy to take your questions. STAFF: Thank you, sir. We'll start with Joe Tabet with Al-Hurra. Q: Thank you, sir. GEN. CROFT: Okay. Q: Yes. If you could give us a sense about your role during the Al-Qa'im operations -- and would you be able to assist the PMF and the Iraqi security forces, if they decide to push further inside the Syrian territories? GEN. CROFT: Sure, so the first step is that the Iraqi security forces are not going to cross the border into Syria. So, from my perspective on -- as the air component coordination element, the air component, as the ISF started from the east in the vicinity of the Anah/Rawa area and marched west, the coalition provided ISR aircraft, so surveillance reconnaissance aircraft, over that part of the battlefield, in addition to the strike aircraft in support of the Iraqi security forces as they pushed to the west. And what they did is they pushed all the way up short of Al-Qa'im. And then, at that point, we had Iraqi security forces come in from multi axes, through -- down the Euphrates River, essentially coming in from the southeast and then the south. And they assaulted Al-Qa'im from multiple directions. And, as you saw on Sunday, Al-Qa'im was declared liberated. So the air component's contribution to that was both precision strike and reconnaissance, primarily. Q: A quick question, sir. Are you able to answer any question related to Syria? GEN. CROFT: I can answer it primarily from the air perspective, if you have a question related primarily to the air perspective. Q: Are you able to give us an update about the advances made by the Syrian regime in Deir ez-Zor? GEN. CROFT: No, I don't have good -- a good update for you on the ground. I can tell you that the air component has aircraft and ISR aircraft essentially over Al-Qa'im and Abu Kamal, and up the Euphrates River Valley. It's all being done simultaneously, and there's a -- quite a large concentration of force from the air component all along from Al-Qa'im, and stretching up towards -- just past Abu Kamal, toward Deir ez-Zor. Q: My last question -- have you seen any Russian activities inside Deir ez-Zor? Some reports are saying that the Russians are -- have established a base inside the city. GEN. CROFT: Yes, I don't have information on Russian ground locations or what they're doing in that city. What I do know is that we have Russian airstrikes occasionally coming in from both the north, and then cruise missile strikes from the Mediterranean. And the air component basically deconflicts from the Russians, primarily for safety of flight, so that we don't have a mid-air collision. And so that's the level of coordination that does occur. It's simply just deconfliction from the Russian air operations. STAFF: Next to Jim Michaels, USA Today. Q: General, can you talk a little bit about how the coalition air support will change as the -- as ISIS's caliphate collapses? Presumably there are fewer conventional targets and so forth. So what will air support look like, going forward? GEN. CROFT: Sure. So, as a -- as a number, the level of air support, if you're measuring it in number of strikes, has dropped by about 60 to 70 percent in the last month -- that's the month of October -- compared to the previous average over the last eight or nine months. That's indicative of the fact that ISIS is collapsing, not only as a physical caliphate, but also in ownership of land. They only now control about 4 or 5 percent of the original area they covered. So the number of targets has dropped dramatically in -- particularly in the last month. From the air component perspective, you're going to see those number of strikes drop even further. But what you will see is a continued requirement for aircraft, such as our remotely piloted aircraft -- those are the unmanned aircraft -- and some manned aircraft to do surveillance and reconnaissance. And, as ISIS is defeated in the Euphrates River Valley, one of our challenges is continuing to find pockets of ISIS as they are -- have moved to the desert, like the Jazira Desert, for instance, which is Northeast of Al-Qa'im, or potentially to the Anbar Desert, which is south of Al-Qa'im. That's going to (inaudible) continued surveillance and reconnaissance. The coalition has that capability, as do the Iraqis in the Iraqi air force. They have fixed-wing manned aircraft that can do surveillance and reconnaissance, as well as unmanned aircraft. So that part of our air support and intelligence and development is going to continue for some time. STAFF: Next, to Kasim Ileri with Anadolu News Agency. Q: Hey, General. Thanks for doing this. You said that the Iraqi Security Forces are not going to cross the border into Syria. But we know that several pictures and videos came out of Al-Qa'im that's -- the Iranian general, Qassem Soleimani, was in the city and kind of pledging to take care of the bordering area with Syria. Do you have anything on the Iranian militias, or Iranian-backed militias, and their assertions -- aspirations in Al-Qa'im? GEN. CROFT: I don't. So the PMF forces are aligned with the Iraqi security forces, and Prime Minister Abadi has said they will not cross the border into Syria. So -- and I've not seen any evidence of that, particularly as we focus in Al-Qa'im. Although -- realize the border, obviously, is a very coarse border. There's no fence, obviously. And so there may be crossing through the border here and there on the Syrian side. But I've not seen anything happen from the Iraqi side, from any of those forces. Q: Thank you. STAFF: Next to Lucas with Fox News. Q: General, have there been any close calls with Russian jets in the skies over Syria recently? GEN. CROFT: No. The coordination, actually -- and it's really just deconfliction -- has been very professional at this point. So, as you're probably aware, as you see reported in news, we have the ability to communicate with the Russians from our Combined Air Operations Center, directly via phone line. And we have taken great -- made great efforts to not appear threatening, to deconflict, to not be in the same -- at the same altitude or in the same location as the Russians, so we don't have an inadvertent accident. And so, up to this point, the actions on both sides have been very disciplined and professional. And that's what we're going to need to have continue over time as the air space over Abu Kamal and Al-Qa'im gets smaller and smaller, as Daesh gets smaller and smaller, as well. And so the challenge is a large number of air forces, or aircraft, if you will, in a very small space. So that discipline and professionalism which has been displayed so far is going to be required to continue. Q: Just to follow up, are these Russian long-range bomber missions and flights, as well as the cruise missile strikes in the Mediterranean, with submarines and ships, into Eastern Syria -- are those very helpful against ISIS? GEN. CROFT: It's hard for me to assess. I primarily concentrate on what happens in Iraq. I can tell you, on our side, it's very -- obviously, it's very coordinated, because we're advising, assisting the Iraqi security forces. Over in Syria, it's harder for me to assess the effectiveness of what the Russians are doing, because essentially we are -- there is no coordination, at least militarily, in the counter-ISIS fight. And so it's hard for me to assess. Q: And finally, are there any discussions of moving the U.S. Air Force component from Incirlik Air Base over to Erbil? Would that be helpful to efforts going forward? GEN. CROFT: We are always looking at our basing options as the fight changes in size and complexity and location. Right now, the answer is no on the Incirlik to Erbil question. But, again, we had moved aircraft inside of Iraq to al-Asad, for example, as we were going down the Euphrates River Valley, just to get closer proximity to the -- to the battlefield. And, as we shift our focus towards surveillance and reconnaissance over the next few months, that may cause a small shift in those types of aircraft. But, in the Incirlik discussion, no. Q: Thank you. STAFF: Next, to Phil Stewart with Reuters. Q: Hello. Just -- can you bring us up to speed about Iranian actions and whether or not there's been any kind of change in the actions by Iran, or Iranian-backed -- Iran-backed militia, as tensions with the Gulf States ramp up? And also, has those -- have those tensions affected your force posturing in any way? GEN. CROFT: Well, I've not seen any effect of Iranian-backed forces, if that's what you're asking. We've had -- Kirkuk is fairly stable right now, and that area -- south of Kirkuk. That's where the Iranian influence would be largest. But, again, we coordinate with the Iraqi Security Forces, and with those PMF -- (inaudible) -- obviously part of that. In the Gulf itself, I don't have a lot of involvement with that part of the -- of the region. But I've not seen a large or any impact, if you will, on Iranian-controlled military forces. Q: Okay, but the -- but the tensions in the region haven't affected your force posture, your force protection activities in any way? GEN. CROFT: No. I mean we always will protect our forces -- is our number one goal. Obviously, we're always on the alert for a change in force or a threat to us which would change our force posturing. So that's always something that we're going to do. But in the -- in the immediate past, I have not seen any significant change. Q: Thank you. STAFF: Now to Wes Morgan with Politico. Q: General, as the demand for strike and other types of assets has declined in your theater, has there been any movement, or do you predict any movement of any different types of air assets out of the OIR theater, to other theaters where they're needed? GEN. CROFT: So we'll continue to assess the threat here. ISIS -- even though the physical caliphate is near defeat, there's still remnants of ISIS in Iraq. And we need to ensure that we don't take our eye off of that ball. You know, sort of like a newly-plowed field -- if you don't tend it, you know, the weeds grow. And I would equate ISIS and everybody else -- A.Q., AQI -- is just a bunch of weeds. You've got to -- you've got to continue to tend that. And that means coalition capabilities like surveillance and reconnaissance. And so we'll continue to do that. Now, in the long term, as things like strike assets -- the requirement for those is reduced, obviously, we are trying to increase our presence in Afghanistan, for instance. The CAOC, since it essentially controls our air forces in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and other areas, can easily flex our air power, day by day, as required, to areas where it's required. And Afghanistan is an example of that. So we can take an air asset and push it to Afghanistan on one day, and the next day, it can fly over Iraq or Syria. So that ebb and flow is something we look at every day, and the CAOC, the Combined Air Operation Center, does every day as the requirement for air support shifts. But I would -- a -- you know, we are -- we are cognizant of the fact that we still need air support over both Iraq and Syria, and -- not be too quick to start reducing that support before it's proven that we can. Q: So no decrease in the number of ISR orbits over Iraq and Syria yet, for instance? GEN. CROFT: Not in the immediate future. Now, what you'll see is that the concentration of those ISR assets over Abu Kamal and Al-Qa'im -- that will be reduced. But those will most likely be used in other areas, to ensure that we've found any other remnants of ISIS that have -- that have moved out of the area as an attempt to try and escape destruction. Q: Thank you. And if I could ask one more, you mentioned that you're up in Erbil temporarily. Has there been any movement of U.S. forces within Iraq, or from Kuwait into Iraq -- into the Kurdish area, as a result of the referendum, or the events in Kirkuk and other tensions along the border up there? GEN. CROFT: No, there's been -- there's been no change. We still have the same forces here, up in Erbil that have been for quite a long time. So there's been no shift in the force structure or composition here in Erbil or in Kurdistan. So -- yes, there's been no shift up to this point. STAFF: Next, to Jamie McIntyre with Washington Examiner. Q: Hi General, two questions. The first one: In the wake of the New York City truck attack, the president said the U.S. was going to hit ISIS harder than ever. But you also tell us that the number of airstrikes is down 60 percent in the last month. Can you help us understand what the president might have been talking about? GEN. CROFT: I think he means the relentless pursuit of ISIS wherever they are. So, back to my previous comments, we need to steel ourselves against declaring victory and walking away. So that means a relentless pursuit of these folks, so that we destroy their leadership and their command and control here, so that it doesn't spread out of these areas, to other areas. So that's just a relentless pursuit. That's the way, I would say, that I'd get after that, and get to -- this region to a self-sustaining capability, where ISIS is reduced to something that can be dealt with through police forces and citizenry, instead of a large military force. Q: And my second question is, as the defeat of ISIS begins to look more and more inevitable not just in Iraq, but also in Syria, a lot of questions about what next -- not so much in Iraq, where they have a functioning government and you can sort of see the path forward, but in Syria. GEN. CROFT: Yes. Q: Do you have any sense for what the endgame might be in Syria? How does -- how does -- what does the -- what would the end look like when it comes? And how do you ensure that their gains against ISIS stick? GEN. CROFT: Yes. I -- well, I think that, obviously, the first one is stability and security. You've got to have that. That's always step one. And then the next one is a representative governance, so that you don't have a disenfranchised population, which is that fertile field that I mentioned earlier, which then leads to the economic growth part of it. And I think that's the -- that is the challenge that lies ahead. And obviously, that's well outside of just the military lane. We could enable the security and stability portion of it, but the remainder is something that the international community's got to weigh in on, to enable the follow-on steps. So that would be -- and maybe I'm -- maybe I'm restating the obvious, but we got to enable the security and stability first, which we can do. STAFF: Next, to Corey Dickstein with Stars and Stripes. Q: Thanks for doing this, General. A couple quick ones, hopefully. You mentioned concerns of some of the -- you know, ISIS folks squirting into the desert northeast of Al-Qa'im. Are there any other areas you guys have observed that ISIS fighters might be trying to mass or, you know, kind of rebuild themselves inside Iraq? GEN. CROFT: Yes, so what's happened is we have significantly degraded their leadership. The high-level leadership of ISIS has been significantly degraded, as long as their command and -- as well as their command and control. So what's happened is you've had -- ISIS is now sort of disintegrating, or disaggregated, which makes it into a -- smaller, little groups of people, which I think -- you'll see them try and go to areas that are maybe lesser inhabited, so that they can't be found. And they may also try and go sort of to ground -- to familiar areas. I think that, if you're an indigenous fighter, that's easy to -- easier to do. I think, if you're a foreign fighter in this land, it's very difficult, and you're probably going to fight or die. So I think what we're going to do is work very closely with the government of Iraq, with their -- with their security apparatus and their intelligence, to continue to identify the locations of these pockets of ISIS fighters and eliminate the leadership. And, if we do that, it disaggregates the ability of ISIS to mount any kind of significant attack. Q: And then, you know, at what point -- do you guys have a point in mind where the, you know, ISR and these strikes really turn over and become, you know, the Iraqis themselves taking care of all of it? Is there -- GEN. CROFT: Yes. So our goal -- our long-term goal -- and you've heard the term "build partner capacity," "reliable partnership," those terms. What we're doing is we have air advisers here, just like we have advisers on the ground, and -- we have Air Force air advisers, coalition air advisers that are building, at least from the air perspective, the Iraqi capability to do this on their own. So, as I mentioned, they have surveillance, reconnaissance aircraft. They have an intelligence apparatus. They have the ability to do precision strikes with the F-16s and with the Cessna 208 Caravans armed with Hellfires and some of the other aircraft. And the ultimate goal is to have the ability of these folks here, through the security forces, police forces and otherwise, to be able to identify, locate and then strike those fighters that are out there in various areas. And a good example of that is the attack that ISIS did on Ramadi. It's probably about a month or five weeks ago now. That was an attack of 200 to 250 fighters that came in from the Anbar Desert, from the southwest of Ramadi, in a bunch of armed trucks with heavy weapons. They fully expected to roll into the -- into the city of Ramadi itself, we think, sort of like they did back in 2014. And, within 12 to 14 hours, the response, which actually was from the ISF first, versus the coalition, was rapid and lethal. And, between the Iraqi security forces, their SWAT teams in Ramadi itself, they were able to repel that attack. The citizens actually helped repel that attack. ISIS then retrograded into the desert and were hunted down, and about a third of all those fighters were killed in the desert, and all those -- all their vehicles and weapons were destroyed. That was an example of the Iraqi security forces being able to react fairly quickly to an attack that was not anticipated. It's that kind of capability that we need to continue to develop. And from my side, it's the air component that enables them to do this. Obviously, the training that we do with the ground forces will enable the Iraqi security forces, CTS and otherwise, to take the fight from the ground perspective. So there's an example of what success looks like in the future, and we see pieces of that right now. And that is the ultimate goal. STAFF: All right. We've reached the end of my queue. Are there any more questions for General Croft? Lucas Tomlinson, FOX News. Q: General, Saudi Arabia's accusing Iran of helping the Houthis launch a ballistic missile at Riyadh a few days ago. Did that impact U.S. air operations, that ballistic missile launch, in any way? GEN. CROFT: No, it did not. We're fully aware of it, and we're -- of the -- of the incident itself. But it did not impact air operations, particularly in Iraq and Syria. Q: Are you seeing an increase in these kind of launches, of late? GEN. CROFT: I don't track Yemen and Saudi Arabia closely, but I'm aware of a few missile launches, obviously, in the last couple of months. I think they come from the northwest of Yemen, primarily. But, you know, again, the Saudis are great partners of ours, and they have Patriot missiles to defend themselves. So that's a success story, when you have -- a country like Saudi Arabia is able to intercept a ballistic missile with a Patriot. Q: Thank you, General. STAFF: Next, to Phil Stewart, Reuters. Q: Can I just follow up on that? Do you have any information about the actual missile itself? The Saudis are saying that this must have been of Iranian provenance, and with Iranian assistance and training. GEN. CROFT: Yes, I -- unfortunately, I do not. I know the Saudis are looking into that. I'm sure they'll be able to look at the pieces and parts of that missile, and try and identify where it came from. You know, the Iraqis, long, long ago, had SCUD missiles. It's a missile from -- it's probably a 40 or 50-year-old design. So there's a lot of missiles out there that could be very, very old, and so the source is going to take a little while to identify. But I think, eventually, you will probably see a report of where they think it came from. STAFF: Back to Corey Dickstein with Stars and Stripes. Q: Sir, do you happen to have the number of weapons released in air strikes for last month, for October, in front of you? GEN. CROFT: It's about 850 or so. STAFF: All right. GEN. CROFT: So that -- so my comment -- my comment earlier, where I said we've reduced the number by about 50 to 70 percent -- in the previous eight or nine months, we were dropping between about 1,800 and 2,600 weapons, depending on the -- on the month. And, when we were in the end of Mosul and some of these other areas, Raqqa, there were some fights -- and the number of engagements. But it's just about 850 or so in the -- in the month of October. STAFF: All right. I think that is the end of the questions, sir. Do you have any closing words for the group? GEN. CROFT: The one thing I'll say is that I think the -- at least from the air perspective, this has been the most precise, proportional air campaign that we have ever done. And we've talked about it for a long time, but I want to reiterate, from Mosul to Tal Afar through Hawija through the Anbar Province, the ability of the air component to support the Iraqi Security Forces is a real success story. And I -- and I -- sometimes I think it maybe gets -- I don't know how much press it gets, but it's -- from my perspective, it's been disciplined, professional and very effective. And what we're trying to do is to continue to enable the Iraqi Security Forces to continue that with their ISR, with their precision strike capability. Because this is the enabler that will allow this country to defeat another enemy, whether it looks like ISIS or otherwise, in the future. And -- and that's what we're trying to build towards, to enable them to defend their own territory against a terrorist threat that has a -- essentially a narrative that is completely false. And I -- I think that's a -- a success story that is worth perpetuating. STAFF: Sir, thank you very much for joining us this morning in -- in D.C. at the Pentagon. We're going to sign off from here. GEN. CROFT: Okay. http://www.defense.gov/News/News-Transcripts/Transcript-View/Article/1365650/ NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address U.S. Department of Defense Press Operations News Transcript Presenter: Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis; Finnish Minister of Defense Jussi Niinisto November 07, 2017 Remarks by Secretary Mattis and Finnish Minister of Defense Jussi Niinisto MINISTER OF DEFENSE JUSSI NIINISTO: So, Mr. Secretary, members of media, first of all I would like to thank Secretary Mattis for being here. The United States -- (inaudible) -- brings stability to our homeland security environment are much appreciated. The main message from the Finnish side is, the United States is a partner of utmost importance to Finland. Our bilateral relations on defense are on solid foundations. We are actively implementing our statement of intent signed last year. However, there are several feats of cooperation where we have prospects of deepening further. For example, the U.S. participation for training and exercises, whether in air, sea or land, have improved our readiness. But there is still room for development. As I have previously said -- large international exercise in Finland in the early '20s would definitely -- (inaudible) - and enhance our defenses. Any U.S. participation -- (inaudible) -- this year would be beneficial and most productive. The regional situation continues to be challenging yet relatively stable at the moment. We see the U.S. presence in the Baltic Sea region and in Europe in general as a stabilizing factor. Yet, as -- (inaudible) -- take care of our own defense, as -- (inaudible) -- government defense report. This, of course, is in no contradiction of deepening defense cooperation. Common understanding and interoperability bring added value. On the operation, we are pleased to see that ISIS is being defeated in Iraq and finally also in Syria. The menace of ISIS must be destroyed in all domains, including information networks. Finland has supported -- (inaudible) -- coalition by some 100 troops and according to new national mandate, we are able to continue until the end of 2018. Finland will also contribute to Operation Resolute Support in Afghanistan. To conclude, thank you once more, Mr. Secretary, for your time and support. And let us go forward together. SECRETARY OF DEFENSE JIM MATTIS: Well, thank you, Minister Niinisto, and gentlemen for having us here. It's an honor to be here with the northern countries. And it's good to see you again after having met very early in my time after being appointed as secretary. I want to congratulate Finland on 100 years of independence. We share your view of independence and of sovereignty, and we salute you for 100 years. We know it didn't come easily for your country and we recognize that today as we look forward to building on those discussions that began at the Pentagon last March. The nature of the security situation, I'm happy to say after the morning meetings this morning, we have a shared appreciation of the security situation, to include a continuing partnership with U.S. involvement in exercises where it actually increases your interoperability and your resilience as a nation. Also want to salute the European Center of Excellence for Countering ISIS Threats. I think it's an organization that's fit for its time, an opportunity for us to share lessons learned and experiences and come up with a way democracies can protect themselves from people with malicious intent. In terms of your contributions to Resolute Support and other missions, I just want you to know that we're grateful for it. We're proud of serving alongside you. Your troops are tactically efficient. They are also ethical. And in this world today, you need that combination, not just of operational capability, but also setting a standard that the rest of the world can admire when it comes to the use of force. And these efforts together, I think, are a reminder that we are strongest when democracies stand united, whether it's in the face of barbarism by terrorists or by countries that would choose to violate international law, sovereignty and territorial integrity. We are hardened by our deepening bilateral partnership, which you referred to, Mr. Minister. I would tell you, if we look to the future, we continue -- we will continue to bolster our partnership. And that's in an effort to create stability and maintain peace up here in this part of world. I think, too, that here in the Arctic region, it builds international confidence to see Finland assuming the chair of the Arctic Council this year. So as President Niinisto said, it's important that the Arctic remains a territory of common respect and dialogue. And we are completely aligned with your presence on that. So, Minister, thank you for hosting us. I look forward to our discussion today. http://www.defense.gov/News/News-Transcripts/Transcript-View/Article/1365589/ NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address U.S. Department of Defense Press Operations News Transcript Presenter: Defense Secretary Jim Mattis November 07, 2017 Media Availability with Secretary Mattis SECRETARY OF DEFENSE JIM MATTIS: So, how was Finland? Q: Good. Q: It was great. SEC. MATTIS: Yes, you almost look Finnish, Paul. Q: You think so? SEC. MATTIS: Yes. Q: And it rubbed off too much. I had too much reindeer, maybe, while I was there. Maybe it's the -- (CROSSTALK) SEC. MATTIS: I mean, the brown shoes, the vest, the beard, I mean -- Q: I need to shave the sides of my head, though -- SEC. MATTIS: Yes. Q: -- properly back, though. That might help. SEC. MATTIS: Yes. It's pretty good now, though. Q: Yes. SEC. MATTIS: We got everybody? Q: I think so. SEC. MATTIS: Yes. Q: Should I turn it up, or -- SEC. MATTIS: Okay. Well, what we'll do -- we'll talk for a couple minutes on the record. I'll say something, you can ask a question or two, and I'll try to keep my voice for a little bit longer. So we're coming out of Finland and a -- what we call the Northern Group meetings, which I was invited to. I'm not part of the Northern Group. I was invited to be there. But it was -- I would just tell you, the discussion -- it -- themselves, in terms of sizing up the security situation up here in the north and how they see it has developed, I'd say, over the last year or two -- no, I'd even take it further back, three years -- especially in the last year -- and you think about Zapad, which many of you have reported on. That was the west exercise that the Russians did -- and then about how we look at the future -- there was a lot of unity there. The security climate, as you know, has become more severe since 2014. 2014 was a watershed year. Even then, some nations tried to explain it. I think those nations have now explained it sufficiently to themselves and their people, and you see the uptick in defense spending that really starts, probably, about a year ago, continues at a faster -- clearly a faster pace today, with Secretary General Stoltenberg being, certainly, in the front rank as the senior NATO person who is leading this effort here on -- in Europe. It's clear that one nation thinks it holds some kind of a veto or strong influence over others -- that's Russia. The -- the country's name came up repeatedly over these -- those -- the last 48 hours since I last saw you. And it's not that we're all NATO countries. Obviously the host nation was not a NATO country. I had a trilateral meeting with them yesterday. I had a bilateral meeting with one of them yesterday, a bilateral meeting with the other today. Then we met with the Northern Group today. And it's -- my point is we don't agree on everything. Like, the majority of Finnish people do not agree on being a member of NATO. But they do support the partnership with NATO. They do support the partnership with the United States. So what, to us, is kind of a perhaps black or white issue is not, to the -- to the people here, as, from their perspective, they deal with the reality up here. So the -- (inaudible) -- 12 nation together -- they were all democracies. And so it shows that we do stand together to reaffirm principles like sovereignty, territorial integrity, things like that. There is no difference of opinion at all, whether it be a NATO country, or an E.U. country, or a -- you know, a non-NATO E.U. country. In other words, however you slice that, the common thread cuts all the way across us. Also, a point that was brought up there -- that peace is not a passive virtue; that it requires active commitment, and that included concrete measures about capabilities and about exercises together. We're now on our way to the NATO defense ministerial in Brussels. We'll continue to reinforce the importance of NATO's role in countering aggression in any of those who would seek to erode the rule of law. And we're going to discuss an enduring commitment to the alliance -- the transatlantic alliance. This is how we do it. We get together. We talk. We make decisions on things, and of course also about combating transnational terrorism. So I don't know -- I hope Finland was of value to you. I hope you got into some press events. Were you there at any of the things we did? You were there, Paul? And what were your impressions, just out of curiosity? Q: It was good. I mean, the Finnish and the Swedish defense ministers this morning made themselves available to some of the press that were nearby. They seemed interested about all the things that you had to say. Going to talk about Afghanistan commitments, potentially, and if they're -- SEC. MATTIS: Yes. Q: -- considering sending troops there. Did you get any feedback from them on that, by the way? SEC. MATTIS: Yes. There was feedback from a number of nations, both formally and informally, about what -- they're looking to uplift their numbers based on the American uplift. Full support for the South Asia strategy, and that was demonstrated by a number of them saying they're going to add troops. Some of them gave us specifics. Some said they have to take it in front of their parliament, get a governmental decision. I just sent them a letter last month, so in some cases, we're catching them kind of in mid-stride, as they're -- as they're doing their own internal government things. But, by and large, we talked about, before I sent them the letters -- that we knew they were going to be on board already. They'd already indicated, even before we rolled it out, that we're -- that, when I was putting it together, they had input into it. So all the better. Go ahead. Yes. Q: I just wanted, actually, just to kind of just jump in on that. SEC. MATTIS: Yes. Q: These additional troops -- is that in addition to the 3,000 that Secretary General Stoltenberg announced this morning? SEC. MATTIS: That who announced? Q: As -- NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg. He announced today 3,000 additional NATO troops to Afghanistan. SEC. MATTIS: I -- yes, I'm not -- I just haven't seen what he said or the context. I -- so I don't want to comment on that right now. We're sending, as you know, a little over 3,000 -- over 3,000 U.S. troops, and then there's more coming from the NATO nations, but also the partner nations -- the non-NATO nations that are there, as well. And some of them are also sending more of the partners. So I won't have -- some of them, I'm going to have to call when I get back, because they're not obvious. Some will be in Brussels for the Defeat ISIS meeting. Some will not be there that contribute troops. Q: Sir ?. SEC. MATTIS: Yes. Q: Last question on the record, sir. Just going back to the U.S., Former Airman Devin Kelley, the shooter who -- SEC. MATTIS: Yes. Q: -- killed those people in Texas -- came out last night -- the Air Force put out a statement, saying that his criminal background wasn't shared with the FBI. Just wondering why that happened and what the Pentagon's going to do to make sure it doesn't happen again. SEC. MATTIS: Yes. I understand the situation as you described it. The -- what I've directed is that the I.G. of the Department of Defense -- this is at my level -- look into the circumstances surrounding this and find out what's going on, as well as the specific circumstance of the Air Force, that -- we're already investigating why they -- it was not shared. I can't offer any more until I get some feedback from the investigating people, both in the U.S. Air Force, and then where I've moved some of it up to my level, in order to look more broadly across the department. Q: How do you -- how do you make sure this -- while you're waiting for the investigation to continue, how do you make sure that, in the interim, this doesn't happen again? SEC. MATTIS: Well, first of all, we have to make certain we've got the right direction out there. And so that's part of what we're looking at in the initial quick look. So, right away, make sure that the right word is out there. Q: So are you planning on sending, or have you sent out any directive to the -- sort of -- Pentagon to say -- SEC. MATTIS: First, I have to define what the problem is. If the problem is we didn't put something out, then we'll correct that. There is an -- at least an indication in what I'm reading the press and what I'm getting from other elements of the government, not DOD, that in fact the direction is out there. And -- but I've got to -- I've got to make sure. I don't want to make assumptions right now. I want to find out what's the problem. Q: All right. Sir, can I ask you about -- Q: On background -- (CROSSTALK) Q: -- can I ask you one more question about Saudi Arabia? Since the reorganization this past weekend, I'm interested to know if you've had any contact with your Saudi counterpart. And what confidence do you have that, particularly with consolidation of power of all the security services -- is not going to have any affect on Saudi Arabia's ability to do counterterrorism -- SEC. MATTIS: Yes. Q: -- contributions to the coalition? SEC. MATTIS: I need to -- I need to get more details on it. Yes, we've been in touch, government to government, and myself included, with the senior people in Saudi Arabia. Q: So the president said he has full confidence. Do you -- do you share that assessment? SEC. MATTIS: I -- (CROSSTALK) SEC. MATTIS: -- I prefer not to even answer that. I need to look at what he said, what context was it in, that sort of thing. So I -- you know, let me get back to you on this, once we've settled some back-and-forth sharing of information between us and the kingdom. Q: Great. Thanks, sir. http://www.defense.gov/News/News-Transcripts/Transcript-View/Article/1365581/ NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address NATO Defence Ministers meet to continue the Alliance's adaptation for the 21st Century NATO - North Atlantic Treaty Organisation 07 Nov. 2017 At a meeting of NATO Defence Ministers tomorrow (8 November 2017), the Alliance will address a range of issues including NATO's Command Structure, North Korea and Afghanistan. Speaking at a press conference ahead of the gathering, Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said he expected ministers to agree the basis for a revision of the Allied Command Structure NATO's "backbone" ensuring it can continue to provide deterrence and defence at home, and project stability abroad. This will include "a new Command to help protect sea lines of communication between North America and Europe, and another Command to improve the movement of troops and equipment within Europe", he said Building on recent progress NATO has made in enhancing the ability to rapidly reinforce Allies, Mr. Stoltenberg said ministers would consider what else the Alliance can do to guarantee "our ability to move forces". He highlighted the need for "close coordination across national governments and with the private sector", as well as the importance of NATO and the EU continuing to work closely on this "vital issue". Cyber-attacks are a growing threat to Allied security, and the revised NATO Command Structure would also make sure the Alliance can respond to cyber threats as effectively as it can "against attacks from land, sea or air". The Secretary General said another key focus of discussion among ministers would be North Korea's ballistic missile and nuclear programmes, which are "a threat to NATO Allies, to our partners, and to the international non-proliferation regime." He added that NATO has "the capabilities" and "the resolve to respond to any aggression". Finally, on Thursday, Defence Ministers and partners will review the situation in Afghanistan, and discuss commitments made by Allies and partners to send more troops to NATO's Resolute Support training mission. Reflecting on his recent visit to Afghanistan, Mr. Stoltenberg praised the "bravery, determination and increasing capability" shown by the Afghan Security Forces. In the margins of the NATO ministerial discussion, US Secretary of Defense James Mattis will chair a meeting of the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address President of Djibouti visits Camp Lemonnier Navy News Service Story Number: NNS171107-13 Release Date: 11/7/2017 2:48:00 PM By Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Jared E. Walker, Camp Lemonnier, Public Affiars CAMP LEMONNIER, Djibouti (NNS) -- President of Djibouti Ismail Omar Guelleh was the honorary guest for a commemorative signing event held at Camp Lemonnier, Djibouti, Nov. 5. This commemorative event celebrated the Multiple Award Construction Contract awardees, who were awarded under U.S. legislation Djibouti First. Djibouti First was designed to strengthen the U.S.-Djibouti bilateral relationship by increasing the economic impact on the local economy. Camp Lemonnier Commanding Officer, Capt. Nancy Lacore said the U.S. is committed to encouraging investment and long-term economic growth in the Republic of Djibouti. "Djibouti provides a very strategic location for U.S. military operations," Lacore said. "As the only enduring U.S. military installation on the continent, we at Camp Lemonnier are grateful to President Guelleh and the people of Djibouti for the sustained hospitality and support." The installation is one of the largest employers in Djibouti, with over 1,000 Djiboutian employees working on the base. "We continually seek opportunities to buy locally, spending more than $10 million annually on local services and products," Lacore said. "This Multiple Award Construction Contract, which we are celebrating today, has the potential to bring millions to the Republic of Djibouti." United States Embassy Djibouti Charge d' Affairs, J. Alexander Hamilton, said the contract was awarded under the Djibouti First Program that passed in 2015. "Since January 2015, tens of millions of dollars' worth of contracts have been awarded to Djibouti First eligible vendors," Hamilton said. "Indeed, in 2016 alone, the United States contributed over 200 million dollars to the Djiboutian economy, representing nearly 14 percent of the total Gross Domestic Product." In fiscal year 2017, the National Defense Authorization Act expanded Djibouti First to what is now known as Africa First to countries where the United States has long-term agreements with host nations in the African region. "Through Africa First, Djiboutian businesses will be eligible for preferential bidding not just in Djibouti, but across the entire continent of Africa," Hamilton said. "This move will open more markets to Djiboutian businesses, and will give local enterprises the opportunity and incentive to scale up." Djibouti Foreign Affairs Minister, Mahamoud Ali Youssouf, said the Djiboutian government expects to see more American development programs in the economy. "This is the best way to lay the foundation of a sustainable and mutually beneficial relationship between the United States and the Republic of Djibouti," Youssouf said. "The United States and the Republic of Djibouti remain committed to the fight against terror, piracy and ... trafficking in persons for the sake of peace and security in our region, in particular, and in the world at large." Hamilton stated both the military partners at Camp Lemonnier and the U.S. Embassy in Djibouti are committed to continuing to strengthen the relationship between the two countries. "The United States is a long-term partner of Djibouti, of the government, and of the people, Hamilton said. "As long-term partners, we want to see Djibouti, and the Djiboutian people, prosper and thrive." The strong and lasting partnership with the Djiboutians has enabled Camp Lemmonier to efficiently and effectively execute the eight lines of operations, which ensure mission accomplishment of U.S. and Allied forces in the region. Camp Lemonnier is one of Navy Region Europe, Africa, Southwest Asia, installations that conducts eight lines of operation to support air operations, port operations, safety, security, housing, MWR, Fleet and Family Support and what is called the core: the fuels, water and power that keep the bases operating. Camp Lemonnier's mission includes enabling joint warfighters operating forward and to reinforce the U.S. - Djibouti relationship by providing exceptional services and facilities for the tenant commands, transient U.S. assets and service members. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address 4 more killed in renewed fighting in Kashmir Iran Press TV Tue Nov 7, 2017 06:00PM A renewed wave of fighting in India-controlled Kashmir has left four more people killed, including a soldier of the Indian army. Reports said Tuesday that the four were killed in a gunfight that erupted following a government siege and raid on some homes in the southern village of Aglar. Officials said the raid was carried out after police and security forces received tips about militants hiding in the village. India labels people fighting against its rule in Kashmir as militants, saying they are linked to Pakistan. Most of the people in the Muslim-dominated region want independence or a merger with Pakistan. Tens of thousands have been killed in decades of violence in Kashmir as India continues to deploy hundreds of thousands of troops to secure the region. Indian authorities said a soldier was killed in the early rounds of the Tuesday clashes that saw villagers throw rocks at military personnel. Police used tear gas to quell the protest, they said, adding that one of the slain people was a nephew of Masood Azhar, a senior Pakistani militant commander who leads Jaish-e-Mohammad, a group blamed for several attacks in Kashmir, including one last month near the airport in the region's main city of Srinagar. Pakistan, which owns part of Kashmir and claims the Himalayan territory in its entirety, has repeatedly rejected India's allegations about harboring militancy in Kashmir, saying it only offers moral and diplomatic support to the anti-India drive in the region. At least 170 Kashmiris have been killed in India's crackdown in the region this year. New Delhi says some 60 soldiers have also been killed in the confrontation. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address NATO set to agree to boost troops in Afghanistan Iran Press TV Tue Nov 7, 2017 05:12PM NATO will increase the number of its troops in war-ravaged Afghanistan, Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg says. The NATO secretary general made the announcement during a news conference in Brussels on Tuesday, ahead of a meeting of NATO defense ministers later this week. "We have decided to increase the number of troops ... to help the Afghans break the stalemate," the NATO chief told reporters. According to Stoltenberg, NATO allies will agree on Thursday to increase by some 3,000 personnel the troop levels for the Afghanistan training mission. Stoltenberg said that about half of the additional troops will come from the United States and the other half from other countries allied with NATO. The NATO contribution would take Resolute Support, which is NATO's train, advise and assist mission, to around 16,000 troops, up from around 13,000 today, Stoltenberg said. Elsewhere in his remarks, the NATO chief said the troops would not have combat roles but would be part of the Resolute Support. In February, US Army General John Nicholson, the commander of US forces in Afghanistan, called for more troops, saying that a few thousand more troops would make a difference in weakening the Taliban and other militants. Under a new strategy announced by US President Donald Trump, thousands of additional US troops will be deployed to the war-ravaged country. The new deployment is the latest sign that NATO is increasingly being drawn back into fighting in Afghanistan. US-led forces formally ended the combat mission in Afghanistan in 2014. The United States has about 8,400 troops in the country alongside another 5,000 from NATO forces. Over the past 16 years, the Taliban militants have been conducting terrorist attacks across Afghanistan, killing and displacing civilians. In addition, the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group has also gained ground and recruited militants across several provinces of Afghanistan over the past few years. Afghanistan has been gripped by insecurity since the United States and its allies invaded the country as part of Washington's so-called war on terror in 2001. Many parts of the country remain plagued by militancy despite the presence of foreign troops. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Trump asks Congress to raise military spending by $6bn Iran Press TV Tue Nov 7, 2017 09:33AM Touring Asia to muster support for stronger action against North Korea, US President Donald Trump has asked Congress to raise military spending by $6 billion. As the American head of state was preparing to leave Japan on Monday, news broke that he had asked lawmakers for $4 billion to complete the installation of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system in South Korea. Washington says the system is supposed to defend Japan and South Korea from the North's missiles, but Russia and China say the THAAD's advanced radar could spy on their territories. The budget request also includes $1.2 billion to fund his request for sending 3,500 additional troops to Afghanistan, part of a new plan that he unveiled in August to prolong US military presence in the war-torn country. The remaining $700 million will be used to repair two US Navy ships in the Pacific fleet USS John S. McCain and USS Fitzgerald which were heavily damaged in deadly collisions earlier in the year. Trump landed in Seoul on Tuesday to meet with South Korean President Moon Jae-in at the Blue House and meet with US and South Korean troops. Tens of thousands of US troops have been stationed in the South, which has been a major ally of the US after they jointly fought the North during the Korean War in the early 1950s. North Korea warns US over Pacific drills Meanwhile, North Korean government officials told CNN on Monday that Washington's actions could "ignite another Korean War." "Nobody knows when and how the 'war maniac' Trump will ignite the 'wick of war,'" the officials said, referring to the presence of US aircraft carriers near the Korean Peninsula. The warning came after US officials said three US Navy aircraft carriers were slated to hold a mock battle in the Western Pacific, as Trump toured the region. The aircraft carriers USS Nimitz, USS Ronald Reagan and USS Theodore Roosevelt and a number of guided-missile destroyers will take part in the war games, the first time the three aircraft carrier strike groups have exercised together in the region in a decade. A Japanese destroyer, the Inazuma, will also join the armada later on, two Japanese government officials said. The warship has already taken part in a separate three-day exercise with the USS Reagan and two Indian navy warships in the Sea of Japan that ended Monday. The four US officials and two Japanese sources who informed Reuters of the drills refused to disclose its precise date or location. The Pentagon and the Navy's Pacific Fleet also refused to give further details. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Saudi Arabia repeats claim of Iran arming Yemen's Houthis Iran Press TV Tue Nov 7, 2017 09:21AM Saudi Arabia has repeated an accusation that Iran is supplying Houthi fighters in Yemen with weapons, days after Iranian officials denied any transfer of arms to the Arab country, which has been under a Saudi-led invasion and blockade. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman alleged on Tuesday that Iran was involved in supplying weapons to the Houthis, which he said "is a direct military aggression" by Iran against Saudi Arabia. He made the claim in a telephone conversation with British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, according to the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA). Bin Salman also said the alleged provision of weapons to the Houthis could constitute "an act of war" against Saudi Arabia. The Houthi movement, which has been fighting back a Saudi-led coalition with allied army troops and tribal fighters, fired a missile at the King Khalid International Airport in northeastern Riyadh on Saturday. Saudi Arabia said it intercepted the missile mid-air. In a statement on Sunday, the Saudi-led coalition, claimed the Houthis were under Iran's "direct command." The Iranian Foreign Ministry rejected the coalition's "destructive, irresponsible, provocative and baseless" allegation, saying Yemenis had shown an "independent" reaction to the Saudi military attacks on their country. Iranian defense officials, too, denied the allegations, saying Iran had no means of transferring arms to Yemen. Separately, in an interview with the US news network CNN on Monday, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir repeated the accusation against Iran. "It was an Iranian missile, launched by Hezbollah, from territory occupied by the Houthis in Yemen," he claimed, adding that Saudi Arabia reserved the right to "respond in the appropriate manner at the appropriate time." That belligerent rhetoric has sparked speculation that Saudi Arabia may take military action against Iran. Speaking in Damascus on Monday, Ali Akbar Velayati, a senior adviser to Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, advised Saudi authorities not to venture into crisis. "Saudi Arabia's government and its officials had better think of their interests more and not get themselves entangled in incidents of their own making," Velayati said. Israel teams up with Saudi Arabia Meanwhile, the Israeli regime, which has recently been jumping at opportunities to side with Arab countries against Iran, has reportedly instructed its embassies in other countries to lobby with their hosts against Iran and the Lebanese resistance movement Hezbollah. Israel's Channel 10 reported on Monday that following Saad Hariri's announcement of resignation as Lebanon's prime minister, the Israeli foreign ministry had sent a directive to all of the regime's embassies to appeal to their host countries to oppose the alleged involvement of Iran and Hezbollah in Lebanon's domestic politics. Hariri, a long-time Riyadh ally, announced his resignation on Saturday in a televised speech from Saudi Arabia, in a move largely seen as made under Saudi influence. Hariri accused Iran and Hezbollah of meddling in Arab countries' affairs. The Lebanese government has refused to consider his resignation, suggesting that a sovereign decision like that has to be made voluntarily. The Israeli foreign ministry directive also urged Israeli ambassadors to convey a message of support for Saudi Arabia amid its war on Yemen, which has killed upward of 12,000 civilians and spread cholera and famine in the Arab world's most impoverished country. "The events in Lebanon and the launching of a ballistic missile at the international airport in Riyadh show that increased pressure is required on Iran and Hezbollah," the foreign ministry reportedly said in the directive. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Yemeni commanders inspect naval missiles at Hudaydah exhibition Iran Press TV Tue Nov 7, 2017 08:28AM Senior Yemeni officials and military commanders of the Houthi Ansarullah movement have inspected domestically-manufactured naval missiles showcased by Yemen's armed forces at an exhibition in the western port city of Hudaydah. Saleh al-Sammad, the president of Yemen's Supreme Political Council, was among the officials visiting the exhibit, during which the missiles belonging to the country's Navy and Coastguard were put on display, the official news agency Saba' Net reported on Monday. Speaking during the event, a senior Yemeni navy commander said the "high-precision" missiles, dubbed Mandab 1, were manufactured domestically. Ansarullah, the national army and popular groups have joined forces to defend the country against an ongoing brutal military campaign launched in 2015 by the Saudi kingdom and a coalition of its allies with the aim of reinstalling the former Riyadh-backed government in Yemen. Yemen's stiff resistance has prevented Saudi Arabia from achieving the goals of war, despite spending billions of dollars and enlisting the cooperation of Western countries, particularly the US and the UK. The exhibition was held a day after the Yemeni army said that it had targeted Saudi Arabia's King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh with a long-distance Borkan H2 ballistic missile in retaliation for the Riydah regime's bloody attacks. The Saudi-led coalition, in a Sunday statement, put the blame for the missile strike on Iran, and unleashed threats against the Islamic Republic. The Riyadh regime has long accused the Houthis of receiving financial and arms support from Tehran. Tehran has all along dismissed the accusations as baseless. The Foreign Ministry rejected the Sunday statement as "destructive, irresponsible, provocative," stressing that Yemenis had showed an "independent" reaction to the Saudi-led acts of aggression. The latest developments come amid a rise in Saudi-led strikes, targeting civilian facilities across Yemen, including residential buildings and farms. Yemen's al-Masirah television network reported on Tuesday that Saudi warplane targeted a vehicle in the district of Baqem in the northern province of Sa'ada, killing one civilian and injuring three others. On Sunday, the kingdom announced that it was shutting down all Yemen's air, sea, and land borders, after Yemen targeted the international airport near Riyadh. UN bodies line up to blast Saudi blockade On Tuesday, the United Nations humanitarian office called on the Riyadh-led alliance to remove the blockade, which hampered the flow of relief supplies into the famine-hit country. "If these channels, these lifelines, are not kept open it is catastrophic for people who are already in what we have already called the world's worst humanitarian crisis," Jens Laerke, a spokesman for the office, told reporters in Geneva. He added, "The situation is catastrophic in Yemen, it is the worst food crisis we are looking at today, 7 million people are on the brink of famine, millions of people being kept alive by our humanitarian operations." Also reacting to the blockade was the World Health Organization, which said Tuesday that the Saudi siege will stymie its efforts to fight the cholera outbreak, which has killed 2,194 people. The head of the UN World Food Program (WFP) also responded to the blockade, warning that hundreds of thousands of children in Yemen would be "on the brink of starvation" if the siege lasts for even two weeks. David Beasley said that about 70 percent of Yemen's 28 million population "do not know where they're going to get their next meal." Beasley said the UN agency is reaching only 7 million Yemenis, "partly because of lack of funds and partly because of lack of access." "I can't imagine this will not be one of the most devastating humanitarian catastrophes we've seen in decades" if access remains shut down, he said. Meanwhile, Ansarullah spokesman Mohammad Abdulsalam has warned that any measure to hinder the movement of Yemeni ships or to close the country's ports could entail grave consequences, which could also negatively impact international shipping in the Red Sea. More than 12,000 people have been killed since the onset of the campaign more than two and a half years ago. Much of the Arabian Peninsula country's infrastructure, including hospitals, schools and factories, has been reduced to rubble. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address NATO To Agree To Send More Troops To Afghanistan Rikard Jozwiak November 07, 2017 BRUSSELS -- NATO allies are set to agree on November 9 to increase personnel levels for the alliance's training mission in Afghanistan by about 3,000 troops, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg says. Stoltenberg told a news conference in Brussels on November 7 that the troops would not have combat roles but would be part of NATO's "train, advise, and assist" mission called Resolute Support. Half the additional troops will come from the United States and the other half from other members of the 29-nation alliance and partner countries, Stoltenberg said. Allies are expected to commit troops during two days of NATO defense ministerial talks starting in Brussels on November 8. The additional NATO troops would take Resolute Support's total to around 16,000 troops, up from around 13,000 today, Stoltenberg said. "We have decided to increase the number of troops...to help the Afghans break the stalemate," Stoltenberg said. Stoltenberg said there will also be more help to develop the Afghan Air Force. U.S. Army General John Nicholson, the commander of the Resolute Support mission and of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, said in February that several thousand more troops would make a difference in weakening the Taliban and other Islamist militants. U.S. President Donald Trump in August announced a new Afghan strategy. In September, U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said that more than 3,000 additional U.S. troops would be deployed to Afghanistan. The United States led an invasion to drive Taliban extremists from power after Al-Qaeda militants whose leaders were sheltering in Afghanistan carried out the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States. The U.S., NATO, and other partners had more than 100,000 troops in Afghanistan for a time, but the Taliban has been resurgent since NATO ended combat operations in 2014. The extremist group Islamic State (IS) has also stepped up attacks. In the latest such attack, gunmen disguised as policemen stormed Shamshad TV station in Kabul on November 7, killing at least two people and wounding two dozen others in an attack claimed by IS. With reporting by Reuters, AP, and AFP Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/afghanistan-3000-more-troops- taliban-nicholson-stoltenberg/28840362.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 Two Dead After Islamic State Attack On Kabul TV Station RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan November 07, 2017 KABUL -- Two people have been killed and at least 20 wounded in an armed attack on a private television station in the Afghan capital, Kabul. "People dressed in police clothes came in and initially threw hand grenades, which killed one of our guards and wounded another," Abed Ehsas, the news director of Shamshad TV, told Tolo News. Interior Ministry spokesman Najib Danish said two security guards were killed in the attack and that two gunmen were also killed. He said police have sealed off the station and are investigating the attack. Afghan special forces blasted a hole in a concrete wall to enter the building and end the crisis. Several employees of the station were hit by bullets and falling glass, Reuters reported, adding that several jumped from windows to escape the gunmen. The extremist Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack on the website of a news agency affiliated with it, Amaq. Taliban insurgents had previously issued a denial that they were involved. Gunfire could be heard within the Pashto-language TV station during the two-hour-long attack. Shamshad TV went off the air during the attack but quickly went back on air after the attack ended. One news moderator appeared on TV wearing bandages on his hands after the station resumed broadcasting. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg condemned the attack during a speech in Brussels. "The last few weeks have been tough in Afghanistan with a number of brutal and senseless attacks, such as today's attack on Shamshad TV," he said. "At the same time, the Afghan security forces have shown bravery, determination, and increasing capability." Amnesty International's Omar Waraich, the deputy director for South Asia, called the attack "a horrific crime that tragically demonstrates the risks Afghanistan's journalists face for their legitimate work." Afghan Journalists Safety Committee head Sediqullah Tawhidi told Radio Free Afghanistan that "an attack against civilians and civilian structures must be considered a war crime." Some journalists and employees of the TV channel managed to flee the building, an employee of the news channel told RFE/RL. The IS-branch in Afghanistan has carried out several attacks in Kabul in recent years, mainly targeting the country's Shi'ite minority. On October 31, an IS suicide bomber struck near the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, killing five people and wounding at least 20. A Taliban suicide bomber killed seven people at Afghanistan's largest private television station, Tolo, early last year. With reporting by AP, AFP, and Reuters Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/afghanistan-gunmen-storm-tv -station-shamshad/28839482.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 Stoltenberg Says NATO To Revamp Command Structure Amid Tensions With Russia RFE/RL November 07, 2017 NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said on November 7 that the alliance is set to create two new command centers, as it revamps its structures to better counter the threat posed by Russia. Stoltenberg said that he expects the 29 NATO defense ministers meeting in Brussels on November 8-9 to agree on an "outline" for a revision of the alliance's command structure. This will include a new command to "help protect sea lines of communication" across the Atlantic between North America and Europe, and another command to "improve the movement of troops and equipment within Europe," he said. NATO had more than 20,000 personnel in 32 commands at the end of the Cold War, but cuts and restructuring have left the alliance with 7,000 personnel in seven structures. Over the past years, Russia's military actions in Ukraine have increased concerns about Moscow's intentions in NATO nations, particularly former Soviet republics or Warsaw Pact satellites of the Soviet Union. Russia occupied and seized the Crimean Peninsula in March 2014 and backs separatists whose war against Kyiv's forces has killed more than 10,000 people in eastern Ukraine since April of that year. A series of potentially dangerous close encounters between Russian and NATO warplanes and navy ships in recent months has added to the tension, with the alliance accusing Moscow of aggressive maneuvers in the air and at sea. Those actions have prompted NATO to step up its defenses in the east, deploying four multinational battlegroups in the three Baltic states and Poland -- totaling approximately 4,500 troops. 'Deterrence And Collective Defense' Stoltenberg said that adapting NATO's command structure was necessary "when tensions are increasing again." "We have to be able to move forces, troops, across the Atlantic, from North America to Europe," Stoltenberg said. "Our ability to move forces is essential to deterrence and collective defense." Meanwhile, the U.S. ambassador to NATO, Kay Bailey Hutchison, told reporters that NATO allies "saw the need to have more deterrence against the Russian encroachment on the east after Crimea." Stoltenberg said that no decisions have been taken yet on where the new command bases would be located. He added that the next meeting of NATO defense ministers in February would be crucial for agreeing more of the details of the revised NATO command structure, which also includes developing means to respond to cyberthreats following a series of global cyberattacks that disrupted multinational firms, ports, and public services this year. Members of the alliance last year recognized cyberspace as a domain of operations in which NATO must defend itself as effectively as it does in the air, on land, and at sea. With reporting by AFP and dpa Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/nato-stoltenberg-revamp-command- structure-russia-tensions/28840751.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 Adviser Met With Russian Deputy Prime Minister During Campaign RFE/RL November 07, 2017 A former foreign policy adviser to U.S. President Donald Trump's campaign has acknowledged in testimony to Congress that he had contact with a high-level Kremlin official while on a trip to Russia last year. According to a transcript released on November 6, Carter Page, an unpaid adviser who left the campaign before Trump was elected, told the House of Representatives' Intelligence Committee last week that he "briefly said hello to" Russian Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich when he traveled to Russia for a speech in July 2016. Under repeated questions about the contact -- which he had at times denied in the past -- Page said that he had spoken to Dvorkovich after his speech at Moscow's New Economic School. "It was a very brief interaction. It was some nice pleasantries. I cannot recall the precise words I said, but it was sort of best wishes, and, you know, that's about it," Page said. Page, a former Merrill Lynch investment banker in Moscow, testified that he saw Dvorkovich again at a dinner during a second trip to Russia in December 2016. When asked if he had a private meeting with Dvorkovich on that trip, Page replied: "We did. He stopped by a dinner I went to in December with people from the university." Page's testimony was part of the committee's probe into alleged Russian interference in the 2016 election and whether it is linked to Trump's campaign. Russia has denied any interference and Trump has denied any collusion with the Kremlin. Page's Russia trips raised questions just as the FBI began its investigation into Russian meddling in the summer of 2016, and he has offered contradictory accounts about whom he met there. At one point, he told the Associated Press that he hadn't met with Dvorkovich, AP reported. But his testimony on November 2 was under oath. The House panel released the transcript from the closed-door interview with Page with partial redactions. Page was subpoenaed by the committee in early October. Page told the panel he had informed some members of the Trump campaign about the Russia trip, including then-Senator Jeff Sessions. He said he mentioned in passing to Sessions, who is now attorney general, that he was preparing to visit Russia and Sessions "had no reaction whatsoever." The testimony could raise more questions about the extent of Sessions' knowledge about interactions between Trump campaign aides and Russians. Sessions recused himself from overseeing an investigation into the Trump campaign in March after acknowledging two previously undisclosed conversations with former Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak during the campaign. Since then, Sessions has downplayed his knowledge about communications between campaign aides and Russian officials. Page has insisted that the July 2016 trip was personal and not campaign related. However, the committee produced an e-mail in which Page wrote to campaign officials and asked them to let him know "if you have any reservations or thoughts on how you'd prefer me to focus these remarks," apparently referring to the speech he gave in Moscow. He also suggested that Trump take his place at the speech -- a suggestion that appeared to go nowhere. In a statement prepared for the committee, Page insisted that he had no personal information that the Russian government or anyone affiliated with it played any role in the 2016 presidential campaign. He said he was not approached by anyone during the trip who led him to believe they were planning to interfere in the election. Page said he had no direct relationship with the Russian government, though he conceded that he may have spoken with different Russian government officials over the years. Representative Adam Schiff, the committee's top Democrat, pressured Page on what he suggested were inconsistencies in his testimony and past statements. He noted how Page told the committee that he had met only one Russian government official during his July 2016 trip to Russia, and yet had told campaign officials in an e-mail that he had received valuable insights from legislators and senior members of the Russian presidential administration. "Are you being honest in your testimony?" Schiff asked. "Because it doesn't seem possible for both to be true." Page said the insights he was referring to were based on materials he had read in the press, "similar to my listening to President Trump in the various speeches that I heard of his." With reporting by AP and Reuters Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/trump-adviser-carter-page -met-russian-deputy-prime-minister-dvorkovich-russia -2016-during-campaign/28839382.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 India Brushes Aside China's Concerns Over DM's Arunachal Pradesh Visit Sputnik News 17:57 07.11.2017(updated 18:35 07.11.2017) Indian Army says Defense Minister's visit to Arunachal Pradesh, part of which is disputed, was aimed at boosting the morale of troops and not unsettling the bilateral agreement on maintaining peace at the border, as claimed by China. New Delhi (Sputnik) The Indian Army has sought to debunk China's claim that the visit of the Indian Defense Minister to the northeastern state of Arunachal Pradesh bordering China would unsettle the tranquility in the frontier region. Indian Army Chief General Bipin Rawat said on Tuesday that the Defense Minister's visit was aimed at motivating the troops guarding the borders in the difficult Himalayan terrain. "Defense Minister visits troops in forward areas to meet them in person, to understand various issues which might be engulfing them. I think visits by the defense minister are always a source of motivation," General Rawat said. Indian Defense Minister Nirmala Sitharaman interacted with the troops at forward army posts at Kibithu in Anjaw district of Arunachal Pradesh and lauded their dedication to service and their efforts in such a remote and inhospitable terrain, according to an Indian Army release. The defense minister was briefed on the situation and defense preparedness along the Line of Actual Control (de-facto border). Ahead of the visit, China's foreign ministry had warned India that the Defense Minister's visit to Arunachal Pradesh, which China considers as part of South Tibet, was not conducive to efforts made by the two countries to maintain peace in the region. "It is an objective fact that there are disputes over the eastern section of the China-India border. We believe that the Indian official's visit to the disputed area of the China-India border may complicate the border issue further and is not conducive to the efforts being made by the two sides to maintain the peace and tranquility of the border area," Hua Chunying, China's Foreign Ministry Spokesperson had said during a regular press conference on Monday. China has said it hopes India will make concerted efforts to continue creating conducive conditions and atmosphere for the two sides to properly resolve the border issue through negotiations and uphold the overall picture of bilateral relations. Earlier this year, China had objected to the Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama's visit to Arunachal Pradesh. Last year, it raised objections against then US envoy Richard Verma's visit. Beijing has been opposed to almost all visits by Indian presidents and prime ministers to Arunachal Pradesh. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Sweden Beefs Up Draft Numbers to Plug Gaps in Army Staff Sputnik News 16:41 07.11.2017 Hardly had Sweden re-introduced conscription after effectively abolishing it less than a decade ago when the government wants to expand the draft to solve perennial personnel problems. The Swedish government has expressed a desire to increase the number of conscripts from 4,000 to 5,000 per year. Defense Minister Peter Hultqvist argued that this step will ensure long-term personnel security and thus even bolster the country's defense capabilities. "We need more soldiers to man the units. The broader the organization with more staff, the more endurance and stamina you have," Peter Hultqvist explained to Swedish Radio. At present, the Swedish Armed Forces have been tasked with investigating the possibility of recruiting more conscripts than the 4,000 to bebe drafted starting from next year. Sweden's defense bosses are particularly hopeful of solving the long-standing shortages of professional army officers by broadening the base of conscripts. According to the Swedish Officers Association, more draftees will inevitably lead to more officers being recruited. Additionally, the fact that large parts of the Swedish defense are occupied by training recruits will significantly undermine the country's long-term defense capacity. "It is quite natural that if a large share of officers are busy with training recruits, they will have less time for their own training," Swedish Officers Association chairman Lars Fresker explained. Sweden abolished conscription seven years ago in a much-lauded effort to switch to a volunteer-based army. The idea never worked out well in practice, however, resulting in drastic staff shortages, as Swedes showed little interest in fulfilling their duty as soldiers. In 2016, Sweden's Armed Forces, which number fewer than 20,000 soldiers in peace time, was reportedly lacking 1,000 squad leaders, soldiers and sailors, not to mention 7,000 reservists. Compared with the 1980s, when it enjoyed a solid personnel size of 180,000 and a military expenditure of 3.1 percent of the nation's GDP, the Swedish Armed Forces have shrunk nine-fold, while its budget plummeted to a mere 1.1 percent of the GDP. Earlier this year, the Swedish government announced that 13,000 young men and women would be called up for army enlistment. Out of those, a total 4,000 will be selected for basic training in 2018 and another 4,000 in 2019. The new target is to have 5,000 recruits per year starting from 2020. Perhaps somewhat ironically, two of Sweden's four recent defense ministers, including incumbent Peter Hultqvist were conscientious objectors. The country's former Supreme Commander Sverker Goransson notoriously claimed that Sweden would only be able to last "for one week at best" in the event of a war, a notion that is widely shared by ordinary Swedes. A survey by the Swedish tabloid newspaper Expressen revealed in February this year that eight out of ten Swedes lacked confidence in the country's abilities to defend itself. Sweden is a sparsely-populated Nordic nation with an area of 450,000 square kilometers and a vast coastline of 3,200 kilometers, yet a comparatively small population of only 10 million. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address NATO Ministers to Agree on Establishment of 2 New Commands - Stoltenberg Sputnik News 16:08 07.11.2017(updated 16:30 07.11.2017) NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has discussed a number of issues with the bloc's defense ministers. MOSCOW (Sputnik) NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has stated that he expected the alliance's defense ministers to agree in principle on the establishment of commands to help protect sea lines of communication between North America and Europe and to improve troop movement in Europe. "I expect Ministers will agree in principle on an outline as a basis for further work. This will include: a new Command to help protect sea lines of communication between North America and Europe. And another Command to improve the movement of troops and equipment within Europe. Our ability to move forces is essential to deterrence and collective defense." The NATO chief said that the new commands would require more resources. "We are not going to make decisions on exact numbers. This is partly about additional resources and partly about whether we are able to reprioritize and be more efficient in the way we conduct and organize our command structure," Stoltenberg said, answering a question about the increase of NATO personnel after the creation of the new commands. He reminded that at the end of the Cold War there were about 22,000 people working in the NATO command structure and there were 33 different commands. Meanwhile, there is less than 7,000 personnel in NATO's command structure in seven commands now, he said. He added that the alliance was planning to decide on the location of the new commands at the meeting of NATO defense ministers in February. On Cyber Defense According to Stoltenberg, NATO defense ministers will also discuss ways to strengthen the cyber element of the NATO command structure. There will be the cyber element "in any military operation, in any foreseeable, possible military mission or operation" of the alliance, Stoltenberg said. "Cyber is more and more integrated into everything we do, and therefore as part of the review and adaptation of the command structure we will also discuss how we can strengthen the cyber element of the NATO command structure," Stoltenberg said. The statement comes about a month after the secretary-general informed the bloc had integrated national experiences in cyber defense into its military structure after Lithuania's repeated calls for increasing cybersecurity across Europe. In September, Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite called on the European Union to create a joint task force that would rapidly tackle cyber attacks targeting the bloc. On NATO Presence in Afghanistan The alliance's chief has announced that NATO has decided to increase the number of troops in its Afghanistan mission from about 13,000 to roughly 16,000. "NATO will continue to support Afghanistan. And we have decided that we will strengthen our support Perhaps, the most important contribution now is that we have decided to increase the number of troops." The NATO chief emphasized that the alliance would not "go back to combat operations" and the additional troops would bulk up the train and assist mission. The statement follows Stoltenberg's September promise to continue assisting the Afghan government in its fight against terrorism. Moreover, the top official called on the Taliban terror group (banned in numerous countries) to begin negotiations as the only way to reach a settlement. Afghanistan has long been suffering from unstable political, social and security situation due to the activity of Taliban and, more recently, the Daesh terror group (also banned in numerous countries). Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Saudi Prince Calls Iran's Alleged Supply of Missiles to Houthis 'Aggression' Sputnik News 12:41 07.11.2017(updated 12:49 07.11.2017) With the conflict in Yemen still far from being resolved, the latest move has seen one of the warring sides lauch a missile attack targeting Saudi Arabia. MOSCOW (Sputnik) Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has lashed out at Iran's alleged supply of missiles to the Houthi rebels in Yemen, the Al Arabiya broadcaster reported Tuesday. According to the broadcaster, prince Salman has called Iran's actions "direct military aggression." The statement came after the Yemeni Houthis launched a missile targeting Saudi Arabia on Saturday. Riyadh managed to shoot down the missile, preventing casualties. The Saudi-led coalition commented on the attack, saying that it considered the missile launch an act of war against the kingdom and reserved the right to respond to Iran, which has been accused of backing the Houthi movement, relying on the right to self-defense. The Iranian Foreign Ministry has strongly refuted the claims. Following the incident, US President Donald Trump has also blamed Iran for the Houthi missile launch. Yemen has been engulfed in a violent conflict between the government and the Shiite Houthi movement, also known as Ansar Allah, backed by army units loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, since 2015. The Saudi-led coalition supporting the government forces, began carrying out airstrikes against the Houthis at Hadi's request in March 2015. Saudi Arabia has accused Iran of allegedly supplying weapons to the Yemeni rebels, in a claim denied by Tehran. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Attacks against places of worship in Afghanistan rise sharply, UN warns 7 November 2017 Afghanistan has seen a sharp increase in attacks against places of worship, religious leaders and worshippers, with civilian casualties since 2016 representing nearly double the cumulative number of the preceding seven years, the United Nations mission in the country said Tuesday in a special report. Since 1 January 2016, the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) has recorded 850 civilian casualties 273 killed and 577 injured in 51 attacks targeting places of worship, religious leaders and worshippers, the report said. Civilian casualties from these types of attacks since the beginning of 2016 represent nearly double the cumulative total documented between 2009 and 2015. Speaking on the eve of Arba'een commemorations that take place at the end of the 40-day-period of mourning after Ashura, Tadamichi Yamamoto, the UN Secretary-General's Special Representative for Afghanistan, said: "Respect the law, stop targeting worshippers and religious leaders." The report highlights a disturbing pattern of attacks by anti-government elements directed at civilians in places of worship, particularly against Shi'a Muslim places of worship and congregations. The report also documents the targeted killings of religious scholars and leaders regarded as pro-government, as well as the targeted killing of security personnel amidst other worshippers inside mosques. Mr. Yamamoto, also head of UNAMA, commended the recent efforts of the Government of Afghanistan to protect places of worship and urged them to take all necessary measures to protect all Afghans, especially those vulnerable to sectarian attacks, to exercise their right to freedom of religion or belief and to worship in safety. The report ends with a series of recommendations, including a call for anti-Government elements to immediately cease targeting worshippers and religious leaders. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address 'Catastrophic' humanitarian blockade in Yemen putting millions at risk, UN warns 7 November 2017 A blockade on basic supplies to war-ravaged Yemen is threatening millions of people and should be lifted immediately, the United Nations said on Tuesday. The call follows a reported decision on Saturday by Saudi Arabia, which is leading the coalition fighting Houthi separatists in the country, to close air and sea ports in Yemen. The three-year conflict has claimed the lives of well over 5,000 civilians and contributed to one of the world's biggest humanitarian disasters, according to the United Nations. Yemen imports up to 90 per cent of its daily needs and seven million people are being kept alive by humanitarian aid. "Humanitarian operations are being blocked as a result of the closure ordered by the Saudi-led coalition, Jens Laerke, a spokesperson for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) told reporters at the regular press briefing in Geneva. He said the UN has received reports that in some areas, the blockade is now impacting the daily life of Yemenis, with fuel prices jumping up to 60 per cent overnight and cooking gas jumping up to 100 per cent. "Long lines of cars are queuing at gas stations," he added. Mr. Laerke said humanitarian flights to and from Yemen were put on hold, and the coalition had asked UN personnel to tell all ships arriving at the sea ports of Hodeida and Saleef "to leave." He told reporters that the current situation in Yemen is "catastrophic." Some seven million people are on the brink of famine and were only being kept alive thanks to humanitarian operations. "That lifeline has to be kept open and it is absolutely essential that the operation of the United Nations Humanitarian Air Service (UNHAS) be allowed to continue unhindered," he stressed. Echoing these concerns, the Office of the UN high Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) also expressed alarm at a series of attacks on civilians in recent days that have killed dozens of people, including several children. On 1 November, OHCHR said, two airstrikes Saudi-led coalition hit a market in Saada governorate, killing 31 traders and guests at a hotel. The following day in Taiz, a Houthi shelling left five children dead, according to OHCHR Spokesperson Rupert Colville. He added that survivors said the children were playing in the street when a rocket from a Houthi-controlled area fell on them. Mr. Colville added that UN human rights chief Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein will soon be appointing an expert panel mandated by the Human Rights Council to investigate alleged violations and abuses of international human rights and international law committed by all parties to the conflict. If possible, the Group of Eminent Experts will identify those responsible. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Television Station Attacked in Afghan Capital By Ayaz Gul November 07, 2017 A bomb-and-gun attack on the headquarters of a private Afghan television station in Kabul Tuesday left at least four people dead and more than 20 wounded. Islamic State claimed it plotted the assault against Shamshad TV in the city. Witnesses said the morning attack began with a suspected suicide bombing, enabling other assailants to storm the facility. Three more explosions were also heard during the siege which lasted several hours before Afghan security forces gunned down the attackers. The broadcaster suspended its programing and resumed it, saying "the attack on Shamshad TV has ended." An employee at the station told VOA at least 20 wounded people, mostly employees at the station, have been taken to hospitals in the Afghan capital. Television footage showed members of Afghan forces' Crisis Response Unit surrounding and trying to enter the building while exchanging heavy gunfire with attackers. The Taliban insurgency swiftly denied its involvement. Abed Ehsas, the station's news director, told the Afghan TOLO channel the attackers threw hand grenades, killing at least one security guard and wounding several others before, "shooting at anyone in their sight." "It was an attack on the media and on the people's voice. It was not the first attack and probably it will not be the last attack [on media]," Ehsas said. Head of Shamshad TV Fazal Karim Fazal told VOA he doesn't think the channel was targeted for any particular reason. "I don't know any specific reason that we should be targeted. The enemy is using all means to shut down any program that gives hope to our people," he said, via Skype. Afghanistan Journalists Center (AFJC), an independent watchdog defending and promoting freedom of expression in the country, condemned the attack as "a brazen assault" on the Afghan media. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg while speaking at the alliance's headquarters in Brussels described as "unacceptable" the attack on the Afghan TV station, saying it underlines the importance of supporting the country to fight terrorists and insurgents. "The attack we saw this morning was yet another example of brutal and horrendous attacks against civilians. The attack has now ended and it was the Afghan security forces that were able to stop it and it shows that the Afghan security forces, they are professionals they are committed and they have the capability to respond when the insurgents are attacking," Stoltenberg noted. Afghanistan is on the list of countries considered most dangerous for journalists and media workers. A Taliban suicide bomber in 2016 killed seven members of TOLO, Afghanistan's largest private television station. Meanwhile,United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan said Tuesday civilian casualties in attacks on religious worship places and leaders, primarily from the minority Shi'ite Muslim community, have increased in the country in the last two years. The mission recorded more than 260 fatalities and 572 wounded in the violence since the beginning of 2016, nearly double the figure for the previous seven years. Two suicide bombings of mosques last month killed at least 72 people in Afghanistan. The deadliest strike was at a crowded Shi'ite worship place in Kabul, leaving 57 people dead. Islamic State claimed responsibly for that attack. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address NATO Sees Taliban Bases in Pakistan 'Big Challenge' to Afghan Peace By Ayaz Gul November 07, 2017 NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Taliban bases in Pakistan pose a "big challenge" to efforts aimed at bringing peace and stability to Afghanistan. Stoltenberg told reporters Tuesday at the alliance's headquarters in Brussels that he regularly raises the issue in meetings with Pakistani leaders and will continue to do so. "We have to address the big challenge that [the] Taliban, the insurgents are working also out of bases in Pakistan. And we have raised that several times. It is extremely important that all countries in the region support efforts of the Afghan national unity government and that no country provide any kind of sanctuary for the terrorists," said the NATO chief. Stoltenberg insisted if regional countries deny sanctuaries to insurgents the fight against the Taliban and terrorist groups in Afghanistan "will gain so much." He spoke just hours after a top Pakistani Foreign Ministry official again rejected allegations terrorists are operating out of her country. Pakistan denies presence of safe havens Foreign Secretary Tehmina Janjua while briefing a parliamentary committed on foreign affairs said Islamabad told Washington in recent high-level bilateral talks that all areas in Pakistan have been cleared of terrorists. Janjua reiterated Pakistani forces will take immediate action if the United States provides "actionable intelligence" regarding the presence of terrorists in the country. She went on to assert terrorists are operating not out of Pakistan, but from across the Afghan border. "In Afghanistan, 45 percent of the country is not under government control, which is why the Haqqani network and other terror groups do not need a safe haven in Pakistan," Janjua said. NATO to boost support for Afghanistan Stoltenberg reiterated NATO will continue and strengthen its financial and military training support to Afghanistan, saying the number of foreign troops in the country will be increased from currently around 13,000 to a new level of around 16,000 troops. "We will not go back in combat operations but we need to strengthen the train and assist and advise mission, the Resolute Support mission, to help the Afghans break the stalemate, to send a clear message to the Taliban, to the insurgents that they will not win on the battleground," asserted Stoltenberg. The only way the Taliban can achieve anything, he noted, is by sitting down at the negotiating table and be part of a peaceful negotiated political solution to the Afghan war. The Islamist insurgency, however, has refused to engage in talks until all foreign forces withdraw from Afghanistan. The Taliban has instead intensified its attacks against Afghan security forces, particularly since U.S. President Donald Trump announced his new strategy for breaking the military stalemate in Afghanistan. Insurgent attacks on Afghan forces have killed hundreds of army and police personnel in recent weeks. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address US Demining Cut Provokes Cambodia By David Boyle, Hul Reaksmey November 07, 2017 A U.S. decision to cut funding for a demining program in Cambodia threatens to further worsen a feud between Phnom Penh and Washington. On Tuesday, it emerged through local media reports the U.S. had decided to discontinue annual funding in 2018, worth about $2 million, to clear explosive remnants of war in Cambodia. Prime Minister Hun Sen reportedly responded to the surprise decision by declaring he will stump to raise the money, according to a senior Cambodian demining official. No public explanation has been given for the cut, and both the Cambodian Mine Action Center (CMAC), the final recipient of the funding, and Norwegian People's Aid, which administer the money, say they do not know why the funding has been discontinued. CMAC Director General Heng Ratana said he had no warning of any cut to the funding before he received notification Monday about the decision. The money covered the salaries of about 300 staffers, many of whom were deminers. "I don't know what the real dispute [is]. We just present the facts and we work together; they never indicated any dispute that we have had, but suddenly they cut the aid," he said. "But we are very lucky that the government, the head, the prime minister, granted approval that he will maintain our operation as usual so that means it has no impact on our operation," he said, adding that funds for the rest of this year had not been affected. The United States had a moral obligation to deal with the legacy of its bombing of Cambodia during the Vietnam war, he added. Ruling Cambodian People's Party spokesman Sok Eysan told VOA he was unaware of the cut, which seemed peculiar to him. "I think that it's an issue which we see that it's not normal. So, no matter what we answer, it will still be not normal," he said. Norwegian People's Aid country director Aksel Steen-Nilsen said he, too, had been unaware about the reasons for the cut. "I mean, of course, there is a lot of rhetoric between Cambodia and the U.S. right now," he said. "But ... I don't see any specific objective related to this because it's the end of the grant cycle, and then of course, it's up to the donor if they have funds and interest to continue or not." Steen-Nilsen said cooperation had been good thus far over the three years the grant had been running and there was no indication of any special reason it would stop. In an email, the deputy spokesman of the U.S. embassy in Phnom Penh, David Josar, said demining remained at the top of the State Department's assistance priorities, but he did not address the specific reason for the cut. "We will use 2018 resources to put in place a world-class removal program targeting U.S.-origin UXO [unexploded ordnance] in eastern Cambodia," he wrote. "UXO experts have proposed that the United States devote more attention to clearing such UXO, in addition to our support for clearing the more lethal Chinese, Vietnamese, and Soviet land mines in western Cambodia." Next year's funding would be opened up to competitive bidding with requests for proposals prepared in consultation with the Cambodian government to be released this year, he wrote without providing any further details. For months, Cambodia has accused the U.S. of fomenting a color revolution a conspiracy plot it has used as the grounds to jail the country's opposition leader, Kem Sokha, and justify moves to dissolve his party. They have seized on the continuing impacts of unexploded ordinance left over from the U.S.'s massive illegal bombing campaign during the Vietnam war a line of attack only bolstered by news of the cut to CMAC funding. Carl Thayer, an emeritus professor at the Australian Defense Force Academy, said the embassy reports he had read also did not seem to be specific about the reasoning for the cut. "So we don't really know the reason why the funding was cut so far, and it's sheer speculation on Hun Sen's part and political opportunism on his part to make that linkage," he said. Any retaliatory action by the U.S. in response to the decimation of Cambodia's opposition party would have been made up front, he said. "There's an expression, 'between conspiracy and cock-up, you always go for conspiracy, and that seems to be what the Cambodians are doing, and until I see a better explanation, I'm saying its just a bureaucratic decision probably made in Washington and passed through without much thinking," he said. Josar said the U.S. had spent more than $131 million on the remediation of explosive remnants of war in Cambodia. In recent years, the main focus of that funding has been on U.S.-dropped unexploded ordnance left in Cambodia's east. Some experts have complained this diverts resources away from more harmful explosive remnants in the west. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Iran Denies Saudi Claim it Launched Missile from Yemen By VOA News November 07, 2017 Iran is denying claims from the Saudi Arabian crown prince that Iran committed a "direct military aggression" against Riyadh when Yemeni rebels launched a missile at a Saudi airport. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, while speaking Tuesday with British Foreign Minister Boris Johnson, called the allegations by Saudi Arabia contrary to reality and dangerous. Earlier, Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, also speaking with Johnson, accused its archrival of potentially committing an "act of war" after the Saudis intercepted the missile fired Saturday at King Khalid International Airport. Saudi Arabia accuses Iran of supplying the Houthi rebels with the missiles used to attack the airport. Iran denies arming the rebels and claims it had nothing to do with the attack. United States Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley accused Iran of violating two separate U.N. resolutions for allegedly providing missiles to the Houthi rebels and said the United States would not "turn a blind eye to these serious violations of international law." "Saudi Arabia's announcement confirms once again the Iranian regime's complete disregard for its international obligations," she said. The Saudi-led coalition battling the Houthis says it has the "right to respond to blatant military aggression" by Iran. "Iranian interventions in the region are detrimental to the security of neighboring countries and affect international peace and security," Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said on Twitter. In response to the missile attack, Saudi Arabia said Monday it would temporarily shut down Yemeni land and sea facilities, and airports, intensifying its blockade of Yemen. A coalition statement says "vulnerabilities in the current inspection procedures" allow ballistic missiles and other military equipment to reach the Houthis. Although officials say the closures are temporary, they did not say how long they would last. The United Nations says it is concerned about how to get desperately-needed food and medicine to suffering Yemenis. Two scheduled humanitarian aid flights to Yemen were grounded Monday. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) blasted the decision to block Yemeni borders and said it could impact the delivery of critical medical supplies to 27 million Yemenis. "Insulin cannot wait at a shuttered border since it must be kept refrigerated. Without a quick solution to the closure, the humanitarian consequences will be dire," ICRC's regional director for the Middle East, Robert Mardini, said in a statement. The Houthi rebels seized the Yemeni capital of Sana'a in 2014, forcing the internationally-recognized president, Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi, to flee to Riyadh. He later returned to set up his government in the southern Yemeni port city of Aden. Saudi-led airstrikes aimed at driving out the Houthis have obliterated entire neighborhoods and killed more than 8,000 civilians. Extremist groups, including al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, have taken advantage of the political vacuum in Yemen to set up militant camps. Yemen is one of the world's most impoverished countries and there appears to be little hope for its distressed civilians. U.N. officials estimate 80 percent of Yemenis lack food, fresh water and medicine on top of a cholera epidemic. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address UN: Saudi Blockade of Yemen's Ports Causing Humanitarian Catastrophe By Lisa Schlein November 07, 2017 The United Nations is calling for an immediate halt to the Saudi Arabian coalition's blockade of life-saving commercial goods into Yemen. The coalition closed all land, sea and air ports in Yemen following a ballistic missile launch by Yemen's Houthi rebels near Saudi Arabia's capital, Riyadh, Saturday. The United Nations reports humanitarian operations in Yemen are blocked because of the port closures. U.N. Organization for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Spokesman Jens Laerke said food, medicine and fuel are not allowed to enter Yemen, making life more difficult for millions of people in this war-torn country. For example, he reported that fuel prices have jumped 60 percent overnight in some parts of the country. He said the price of cooking gas has doubled and long lines of cars are queuing at gas stations. "We are very concerned about the likely rapid negative impact of the closure of Yemen entry points on the already dire humanitarian situation in the country where seven million people are fighting against famine-like conditions... and rely completely on humanitarian aid to survive," he said. If the supply pipeline comes to a halt, Laerke warned food insecurity will deepen and Yemen will be facing a greater humanitarian crisis. "Between 80 and 90 percent of food imports are coming in through these ports prior to the crisis," he added. "If these channels these lifelines are not kept open, it is catastrophic for people who already, in what we have already labelled the world's worst humanitarian crisis at the moment." The Saudi Arabian coalition began an intensive campaign of air strikes against the Houthi rebels in support of the Yemeni government in March 2015. Since then, the United Nations reports more than 14,000 civilian casualties. These include nearly 5,300 people killed and almost 8,900 injured. The United Nations adds the actual number of civilian deaths and injuries is likely to be far higher. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address AMISOM Says 1,000 Troops to Leave Somalia By Harun Maruf November 07, 2017 African Union peacekeeping troops will start withdrawing from Somalia next month, says the head of the AU mission in the country. Francisco Madeira told a news conference in Mogadishu that 1,000 soldiers from the five troop-contributing countries Uganda, Burundi, Ethiopia, Kenya and Djibouti will depart. "As a result of this, troop movements have started in different parts of the country and will continue for the coming weeks," Madeira said Tuesday. "This is a process of realignment to effect the reduction in numbers and also begin the handover process of national security responsibilities to the Somali national security forces." Members of the AU mission, known as AMISOM, have warned for over a year they may pull their troops from Somalia. AMISOM has been helping Somali governments battle militant group al-Shabab since 2007. Madeira said the withdrawal will be conducted with caution to ensure that the security of the Somali people is not comprised. "Our drawdown and transition must be gradual, conditions-based, responsible and done in a manner that does not compromise the safety and security of the Somali people," he said. He said, "We'll exit this place when the SNA [Somali National Army] is ready to take over, when the SNA feel that we can now leave." The announcement to reduce troops comes a day after AMISOM announced an operation to flush out al-Shabab militants from the Lower Shabelle region and secure main supply routes in the area. Paul Williams, an associate professor at George Washington University who is writing a book about AMISOM, says the troop reduction was not unexpected. "The plan was always to reduce by 1,000 troops and add an additional 500 police by December 31st, 2017. Then there would be additional reductions and potentially reconfigurations by October 2018," he said. New military offensive Madeira reiterated that AMISOM will be part of the much publicized offensive against al-Shabab in collaboration with the Somali National Army. "We as AMISOM are aware of these preparations and we are going to work side by side with the government to defeat al-Shabab," he said. "We are going to fight al-Shabab in all fronts, I'm not going to tell you which specific fronts so that al-Shabab does not run away from there but you will be seeing." Madeira said areas of upcoming operations will include Mogadishu and its surroundings, and urged the public to support the troops. "Even if tomorrow or this afternoon or the day after tomorrow you see some other bombs blasting here in Mogadishu don't worry because we are dealing with an invisible enemy and it has infiltrated some of these places but this is going to be stopped," he said. No additional Ethiopian troops Madeira, who is from Mozambique, denied media reports that additional Ethiopian troops entered Somalia. He said troops who entered Somalia last week were just part of a routine rotational exercise. "It just happens that troops that come from Uganda fly in, but the troops that come from Ethiopia, they can come through the border, because they can just drive, and people with other intentions are saying Ethiopians are amassing into Somalia," he said. The president of Somalia recently visited Uganda, Ethiopia and Djibouti, seeking support for the promised offensive against al-Shabab. The government promised the offensive following the deadly October 14 truck bomb explosion in Mogadishu that killed 358 people, with 56 others missing and presumed dead. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address North Korea Situation Requires Worldwide Action, Trump Says By Terri Moon Cronk DoD News, Defense Media Activity WASHINGTON, Nov. 7, 2017 North Korea constitutes a worldwide threat that requires worldwide action, President Donald J. Trump said today in a press conference with South Korean President Moon Jae-in at the Blue House in Seoul. "We call on every responsible nation, including China and Russia, to demand that the North Korean regime end its nuclear weapons and its missile programs and live in peace," the president said in one of two joint press conferences during his trip to Asia. "As the South Korean people know so well, it's time to act with urgency and with great determination." Trump called for all nations to put into effect U.N. Security Council regulations and to cease trade and business entirely with North Korea. "It is unacceptable that nations would help to arm and finance this increasingly dangerous regime," he emphasized. South Korea has been a long-standing U.S. ally, and North Korea's threats cannot be allowed to threaten that partnership, Trump said. "Our alliance is more important than ever to peace and security on the Korean Peninsula and across the Indo-Pacific region," he added. Mutual Defense Treaty "In the more than six decades since we signed our mutual defense treaty, our alliance has grown stronger and deeper. Our two nations symbolize what independent countries can accomplish when they serve the interests of their people, respect the sovereignty of their neighbors and uphold the rule of law," Trump said of the U.S.-South Korea alliance. "Together, our two nations will handle threats to peace and security, stand up to those who would threaten our freedom and boldly seize the incredible opportunities for a better, brighter and more prosperous tomorrow," he said. In good times and bad, in moments of great hardship and great success, both nations can always count on the close bonds and deep friendship they share as free, proud and independent people, the president said of the alliance. "Imagine the amazing possibilities for a Korean Peninsula liberated from the threat of nuclear weapons, where all Koreans could enjoy the blessings of liberty and the prosperity that you have achieved right here in South Korea," Trump said. Call for Denuclearization Talks Moon said the United States and his country strongly urge North Korea to halt its nuclear and missile provocation, and to come to a dialogue table for denuclearization as soon as possible. "President Trump and I reaffirmed our current strategy, which is to maximize pressure and sanctions on North Korea until it gives up nuclear weapons and to come to the table for dialogue on its own," the South Korean president said. "At the same time, should North Korea choose to make the right choice, we also reaffirmed our view that we are willing to offer North Korea a bright future," Moon said. Camp Humphreys Visit Earlier in the day, the two presidents visited Camp Humphreys at Pyeongtaek to visit U.S. and South Korean service members. Trump said South Korea's military is strong, and the U.S. military will soon be at its strongest level. "We're committed to spending $700 billion, and that number may even go up. For our military, we're ordering new jet fighters [and] new equipment of virtually every kind," the president said to Moon. "We make the finest equipment in the world, and you're buying a lot of it, and we appreciate that." NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address North Korea: We Will Build Nuclear Power Until the US Leaves Us Alone Sputnik News 22:04 07.11.2017 To herald the arrival of US President Donald Trump in South Korea, North Korea has reaffirmed their resolve to bolster their nuclear arsenal and oppose the US and its allies. The sky-high tensions in the Korean Peninsula have entered their seventh month, with no signs of breaking. The official publication of the Workers' Party of Korea, Rodong Sinmun, chastised the US for its "reckless military provocations facilitating self-destruction." Specifically, the statement pointed to planned US military exercises that would involve aircraft carriers skirting North Korean territorial waters. The aircraft carriers USS Nimitz, USS Ronald Reagan, USS Theodore Roosevelt, and all their accompanying retinues are expected to participate in joint exercises in the Pacific later this week. The announcement of the exercises, which came on Tuesday morning, has been interpreted as a show of the sheer power of the US Navy: no military on Earth other than the Americans' has more than two aircraft carriers in service. The US has 10. "US warmongers are increasing extreme tension here by holding a joint military exercise in the nearby waters of the peninsula with three nuclear aircraft carrier strike groups," Rodong said, noting that they expected "provocation" during Trump's Asia visit. "As long as the US and its puppets engage in hostile acts and invasive attempts against us, and as long as imperialism, the root of evil and injustice, is left on Earth, we will further build up our nuclear power." To the surprise of many, Trump took a conciliatory tone during a press conference in South Korea. Although he engaged in the usual rhetoric pertaining to the North, claiming that Pyongyang is "threatening millions and millions of lives so needlessly" and that its missile program is "a threat, not only to the people of South Korea, but to the people all across the globe," he also hinted that he was interested in a diplomatic solution. Or a "deal," in the parlance of the businessman-in-chief. Trump said that both he and South Korean President Moon Jae-in were "strongly urging" North Korea to "come to the table [and] make a deal" with the US and South Korea. "It makes sense for North Korea to do the right thing," said Trump. "[It] really makes sense for North Korea to come to the table and make a deal." He also cryptically remarked that he did "see certain movement" coming from Pyongyang. Moon added that he and Trump agreed to maximize military, economic and diplomatic pressure until North Korea returned to "sincere" talks regarding an end to their missile and nuclear programs. Should the DPRK cooperate, Moon said, they could be facing a "bright future." Trump's past rhetoric has been far more bellicose, though. In August, Trump tweeted that "talking is not the answer" to the current stand-off, and that US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson was "wasting his time trying to negotiate with [North Korean leader Kim Jong-un.]" He has also vowed to unleash "fire and fury" against North Korea if they continued to threaten the US in August, and to "totally destroy" the insular Asian nation if it attacked the US or its allies. Previously, Kim has claimed that he would not negotiate unless he could do so from a position of strength, meaning a nuclear intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) that could strike anywhere in the US. Twice in 2017, the DPRK tested their Hwasong-14 ICBM, which may be able to do just that. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Trump Offers Reassurance, Resolve on North Korean Nuclear Crisis By Steve Herman November 07, 2017 President Donald Trump shed his fiery rhetoric toward North Korea on Tuesday instead delivering a message of resolve and optimism to South Korea, saying he believes "ultimately, it'll all work out" when it comes to Pyongyang's nuclear threat. After a full day of meetings and public appearances with President Moon Jae-in in Seoul, Trump said diplomatic progress has been made to diffuse heightened tensions in the region. "May freedom and peace flourish on this peninsula," said Trump at a state dinner. "Together our nations will remind the world of the boundless potential of societies that choose freedom over tyranny." He added, "we will make things beautiful, especially the aspiration of your people." President Moon said "the peace of my country" is under threat, but added the longtime alliance between the U.S. and Republic of Korea comes with an "overwhelming superiority of power" that "will eventually make North Korea cease its reckless provocations and make North Korea come out for dialogue for denuclearization." "War must not break out again on the Korean Peninsula," said Moon. Trump's words marked a striking departure from the tone of his tweets in recent weeks suggesting talks with Pyongyang to resolve the nuclear crisis were "a waste of time." The increasingly fiery rhetoric from the U.S. and North Korea leaders raised concerns about a potential nuclear confrontation on the Korean peninsula. Earlier, Trump said Washington and Seoul are working together for a peaceful resolution to the situation with North Korea and added "I believe it makes sense for North Korea to do the right thing" by coming to the negotiating table. But he also said the U.S. "stands prepared to defend itself and its allies using the full range of our unmatched military capabilities if need be." During a joint news conference, Trump and Moon said it is unacceptable for any nation to help arm and finance the regime of Kim Jong Un. Trump added North Korea's nuclear and ballistic missile weapons program posed a "worldwide threat that requires worldwide action." Trump said the United States and South Korea cannot allow Pyongyang "to threaten all that we have built" since the Korean War six decades ago. Trump and his wife Melania arrived in Seoul earlier Tuesday, beginning their two-day visit with a trip to Camp Humphreys, a U.S. military base located about 100 kilometers from the demilitarized border separating communist North and democratic South. During a meeting with military commanders, Trump told reporters the situation with Pyongyang "will all work out, it always works out, it has to work out." Later in the day, President Moon told his U.S. counterpart during talks at the presidential Blue House he hoped his visit will serve as a "turning point in resolving the North Korean nuclear issue" and relieve the "anxiety" among South Koreans about the situation. Grant Newsham, a senior research fellow at the Japan Forum for Strategic Studies, told VOA's Victor Beattie there is little daylight between the two countries on North Korea, despite Trump's bellicose rhetoric and Moon's insistence on diplomacy plus sanctions. "I think where the real problem is that when the U.S. tries to get a trilateral Japan-Korea-America relationship going, particularly in the military sphere, there's really a limit to how far that will go, or [how far] President Moon will let it go," said Newsham. Tokyo visit During his first stop in Tokyo earlier this week, Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe agreed that "all options are on the table" when it comes to dealing with North Korea. Abe, at a news conference with Trump at the Akasaka Palace in Tokyo, said Monday there is "no point in dialogue for the sake of dialogue with North Korea" and the time has come to exert maximum pressure on Pyongyang. A nearly three-year war on the Korean peninsula in the early 1950s ended in a stalemate that pitted the United States, South Korea and the United Nations against North Korea, which was backed by forces from China and the Soviet Union. No peace treaty was signed and the Korean peninsula has remained divided ever since. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Indian Scientists Successfully Fire Electromagnetic Railgun (Mach 6) Test Shot Sputnik News 20:22 07.11.2017(updated 20:36 07.11.2017) The Indian Defense Research organization hopes to soon complete trials of electromagnetic railguns that would give the country's naval forces a superlative advantage and a capability to launch devastating attacks on both land and sea targets. NEW DELHI (Sputnik) Indian defense scientists have successfully developed electromagnetic railguns (EMRG) that can fire projectiles at Mach 6 (six times the speed of sound) or 4,600 miles per hour. Such railguns are touted as one of the future technologies of warfare, as they use kinetic and laser energy instead of controlled explosives for firing missiles. According to the state-owned Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO), a 12 mm square bore EMRG has been successfully tested and they are preparing for the 30 mm variety. The target is to accelerate a one kilogram projectile to a velocity of more than 2,000 m/s with a capacitor bank of 10 megajoules. "A simple, single pulse driven railgun launcher was developed with a minimum of metal components in proximity to the bore to maximize the inductance of the launcher and to improve the launch efficiency. The launcher has a 12 mm square bore cross-section. The launcher was fabricated with lengths ranging from 1 to 2 meter," a defense scientist involved with the project told Sputnik on condition of anonymity. Experts are of the opinion that India is gaining expertise beyond the conventional fields for technology development. "As handling will be very easy, the armed forces can deploy it at any location in an emergency situation. It will be a very tactical weapon for the naval forces, Rajiv Nayan, a missile technology expert at the Delhi-based Institute for Defense Studies and Analyses (IDSA), told Sputnik. Another expert believes that such technological advancements will not only provide more teeth to the armed forces, but will also affect a change in the principles that guide the Indian military's approach to warfare. "These are the times of early stages of development and more such tests in the future would help India to operationalize this technology, which eventually could demand some changes into the military doctrines," Ajey Lele, a security analyst at IDSA, told Sputnik. India expects to equip its naval forces with EMRG as the system has the potential to provide responsive, long-range, accurate and high-volume naval surface fire support. Railguns will also eventually be able to engage surface targets in direct-fire mode. Overall, EMRG will offer numerous advantages over conventional naval gunfire systems, as they have extremely long range, speed and accuracy thus nullifying the escape factor of an enemy platform or approaching projectile. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Iran urges EU to clarify response to possible US withdrawal from JCPOA ISNA - Iranian Students' News Agency Tue / 7 November 2017 / 16:16 Tehran (ISNA) - Iran's deputy foreign minister Majid Takht-Ravanchi has urged Europe to clarify how it will react if Washington abandons the multinational Iran deal and imposes news sanctions on the country. Speaking at a conference in the French capital, Paris, on Tuesday, Takht-Ravanchi said that Tehran would not be the first party to withdraw from the nuclear accord, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), but it has prepared itself for any scenario, Press TV reported. He made the remarks after US President Donald Trump said he would not continue to certify Iran's compliance with the terms of the JCPOA and kicked the issue to Congress. Congress was given 60 days to decide whether to reimpose sanctions that were lifted under the deal, in exchange for restrictions on Iran's nuclear activities. End Item NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address US should comply with Iran nuclear deal: EU top diplomat Iran Press TV Tue Nov 7, 2017 06:34PM The EU foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini, says the bloc is working with US Congress and President Donald Trump's administration to ensure Washington's compliance with Iran's nuclear agreement. Speaking at a Tuesday news conference in Washington, Mogherini said she had underlined the importance of the landmark nuclear deal in meetings with administration officials and lawmakers in Washington this week. Mogherini expressed hope that the US would fulfill its obligations under the deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of action (JCPOA), saying, "We want to see the United States continue its implementation in the future." "The EU has a security interest in keeping the deal working," she added. Mogherini also stated that she had gotten a "clear indication that the intention is to keep the US compliant with the agreement," adding that US lawmakers had signaled they were planning to ensure Washington would comply with the Iran nuclear deal. The top EU diplomat dismissed Washington's proposal to renegotiate the nuclear deal, saying, "If you reopen one part of it, the entire agreement is reopened." "Renegotiating part of the agreement is not an option," Mogherini emphasized. Iran and the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council the United States, France, Britain, Russia and China plus Germany signed the nuclear agreement on July 14, 2015 and started implementing it on January 16, 2016. Under the JCPOA, Iran undertook to put limits on its nuclear program in exchange for the removal of nuclear-related sanctions imposed against Tehran. Although the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has repeatedly verified Iran's compliance with the deal, Trump delivered an anti-Iran speech on October 13, in which he said he would not continue to certify Iran's compliance and warned that he might ultimately terminate the agreement. Trump has now kicked the issue to Congress, which has been given 60 days to decide whether to reimpose sanctions that were lifted under the deal. Except for the US, the other parties to the accord - Britain, Germany, France, Russia, China and the European Union - have all reaffirmed their commitment to it and urged the United States not to back out. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on October 31 that the US administration could not use Congress decisions as a smokescreen, stressing that Washington sought to create obstacles to prevent Iran from benefiting from the multilateral nuclear deal. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Mogherini Says U.S. Lawmakers Aim To Comply With Iran Nuclear Deal RFE/RL November 07, 2017 The European Union's foreign policy chief says U.S. lawmakers have signaled they plan to ensure the United States complies with the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement. Speaking to reporters in Washington on November 7, Federica Mogherini declined to comment on whether legislation pending before Congress that would attach additional conditions for U.S. sanctions relief would violate the landmark nuclear accord. However, she said she "got clear indications that the intention is to keep the United States compliant with the agreement." U.S. President Donald Trump last month refused to recertify the deal under which Tehran agreed to curb its atomic program in exchange for sanctions relief. In an address on October 13, Trump slammed Tehran for what he said are violations of the "spirit" of the agreement between six global powers and Tehran, in part for its continued testing of ballistic missiles and its support for extremists in the Middle East. He asked Congress to strengthen a U.S. law related to the deal in order to put additional pressure on Tehran by setting up triggers for the imposition of sanctions. The U.S. president also said he would seek the removal of so-called sunset clauses, which set expiration dates for some restrictions on Iran's nuclear program under the deal. He threatened to withdraw the United States from the deal if his goals are not met, and has repeated that threat in subsequent remarks. The European Union and the other parties to the deal -- Russia, Britain, China, France, and Germany -- have all urged Trump not to pull the United States out of the agreement. Mogherini, one of the negotiators of the agreement, said that she stressed the importance the EU places on upholding the agreement in meetings with lawmakers in Washington. "We want to see the United States continue its implementation in the future," she said. "The EU has a security interest in keeping the deal working." Mogherini also reiterated that the agreement cannot be reopened for negotiation -- a stance also held by Iran and the other signatories to the accord. "If you reopen one part of it, the entire agreement is reopened," she said. With reporting by AFP, AP, and Reuters Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/iran-nuclear-deal-mogherini- u-s-lawmakers/28840811.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 Netanyahu Confidant Yitzhak Molcho Interrogated in Submarine Corruption Probe Sputnik News 18:45 07.11.2017 Corruption investigations surrounding Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are hotting up, after his close confidant and personal envoy Yitzhak Molcho was arrested by police scrutinizing the infamous ThyssenKrupp submarine deal. Yitzhak Molcho, Netanyahu's chief negotiator and personal envoy for over a decade, was named November 7 as a suspect in the investigation into alleged corruption in Israel's purchase of submarines from German shipbuilder ThyssenKrupp. Molcho, along with legal partner David Shimron (Netanyahu's cousin and personal attorney), was detained by Israeli police for questioning November 5, and has since faced two unrelenting days of interrogation. Shimron, who has previously been questioned under caution in the investigation, dubbed Case 3000, was publicly identified upon his detention Molcho's name remained under gag order until Tuesday. Investigators suspect state officials were paid bribes to influence the decision to buy submarines and patrol boats from ThyssenKrupp, despite opposition from the defense ministry. Police suspect Molcho tried to push the submarine deal during his diplomatic trips abroad, conducted on behalf of Netanyahu, while Shimron sought to promote the interests of the German shipbuilders within Israel as a result, Molcho faces potential charges of breach of trust as a public servant. Shimron has already been questioned several times as part of the investigation by police anti-corruption unit Lahav 433. He served as a lawyer for Miki Ganor, ThyssenKrupp's local representative, who turned state's witness in July and is considered a key suspect in the case. Molcho is also believed to have been implicated by Ganor, who testified to Shimron had touted his partner's ability to push ThyssenKrupp's interests in winning the tender. Fulfilling Farewell The investigation of Molcho as a criminal suspect comes a mere fortnight after he resigned as Netanyahu's chief negotiator, a position he held since 2006. Most notably, he served as an envoy during the failed 2013-2014 Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. In a statement, he said he was stepping down as he felt he'd fulfilled his obligations. However, the announcement came a day before the state was set to provide a response to a High Court of Justice petition calling on Molcho to suspend himself over the conflict of interest charges. His confidants said he'd simply tired over the years, and his weariness was exacerbated by incessant personal attacks, despite his work being on a volunteer basis. The petition argued Molcho, even if he wasn't a suspect in the case, couldn't continue as an envoy on international affairs given that his legal partner was profiting from deals made by the Israeli government. Netanyahu is expected to provide testimony in the case before November 10. He has not yet been named as a suspect in Case 3000, but is to be questioned by police in two other corruption investigations in which he is a suspect, known as Cases 1000 and 2000. In the first instance, Netanyahu his wife Sara are suspected of receiving illicit gifts from billionaire benefactors, most notably hundreds of thousands of shekels' worth of cigars and champagne from the Israeli-born Hollywood producer Arnon Milchan. In the second, Netanyahu and Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper publisher Arnon Mozes have been accused of entering an illicit quid-pro-quo deal that would have seen the Prime Minister weaken a rival daily, Israel Hayom, in return for more favorable coverage from Yedioth. Netanyahu has denied wrongdoing in both cases, although has been questioned four times since the allegations surfaced in December 2016. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address UN Security Council calls on Myanmar to end excessive military force in Rakhine state 6 November 2017 Strongly condemning the widespread violence in Myanmar's Rakhine state, which has led to the displacement of over 600,000 members of the country's minority Muslim Rohingya community, the United Nations Security Council on Monday called on the Government to end the use of excessive military force and intercommunal violence in the region. In a statement read out by Sebastiano Cardi of Italy, the President of the Security Council for the month of November, the 15-member body also called on the Government "to restore civilian administration and apply the rule of law, and to take immediate steps in accordance with [the Government's] obligations and commitments to respect human rights, including the rights of women, children, and persons belonging to vulnerable groups, without discrimination and regardless of ethnicity, religion, or citizenship status." The Council also urged the Government to implement measures in line with its resolution 2106 (2013) to prevent and respond to incidents of sexual violence, and encouraged it to work with the Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict. The Council also expressed concern over severely limited humanitarian access to the affected parts of the region and demanded that the Government ensure immediate, safe and unhindered access to UN and other humanitarian actors, and ensure the safety and security of humanitarian personnel. In the Presidential Statement, the Security Council also welcomed the Myanmar's decision to establish a "Union Enterprise Mechanism" and urged the Government to ensure that the Mechanism supported such return and allowed United Nations agencies full access. Further, welcoming the Government's support for recommendations by the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State and calling for their full implementation, the Council stressed the importance of transparent investigations into allegations of human rights abuses and violations, including sexual violence and abuse and violence against children, and of holding to account all those responsible for such acts. "In this regard, the Security Council calls upon the Government of Myanmar to cooperate with all relevant United Nations bodies, mechanisms and instruments, in particular the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights," added the Presidential Statement. Also in the Statement, the Council commended the provision of humanitarian assistance and support for dialogue by Bangladesh as well as other regional countries and organizations; and requested the Secretary-General to continue to engage with the Myanmar through good offices. It also encouraged the UN chief "to consider, as appropriate, appointing a Special Adviser on Myanmar." NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address South Korea on talks with US to buy nuclear submarine, reports say Iran Press TV Tue Nov 7, 2017 03:06PM South Korea is reportedly negotiating with the United States to purchase a nuclear-powered submarine to boost its guard against alleged threats from North Korea, as US President Donald Trump says Seoul will buy US weapons worth "billions of dollars." Multiple South Korean news outlets announced the news on Tuesday, the day Trump commenced his two-day visit to the Far East Asian country as part of his Asia tour amid escalated tensions between Washington, the South's key security guarantor, and Pyongyang over North Korea's nuclear and missile programs. "The strategic assets under discussion include a nuclear-powered submarine and a sophisticated surveillance asset," the reports quoted an unnamed senior official of South Korean President Moon Jae-in's office as saying. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, added that Seoul would have "close consultations" with the White House about "these two" in the future. Acquiring such advanced military assets by South Korea will definitely redraw the balance of power in northeast Asia and could start a regional arms race. Japan, another US ally in the region, does not have such subs and is barred from building a military under its post-World War II pacifist constitution. Although China, a US main rival, has nuclear subs in its naval fleet, Beijing would certainly be exasperated by any such acquisition by Seoul. Being indispensable to any seaborne nuclear deterrent, nuclear submarines can remain submerged for several months due to their air-independent propulsion. This capability gives them a far greater range than their conventional counterparts, the diesel-powered ones. After holding a summit with President Moon in Seoul, Trump said at a joint press conference with his South Korean counterpart that Seoul would be purchasing a large amount of US weapons "whether it's planes, whether it's missiles, no matter what it is." The US president added that Seoul would be ordering "billions of dollars of that equipment, which for them makes a lot of sense and for us it means jobs, reducing our trade deficit with South Korea." Moon provided no specific details of the planned purchases but he described them as "essential" for national defense. South Korea is currently barred from developing domestic atomic weapons under a deal with the US, which in turn provides Seoul with a "nuclear umbrella" against potential attacks by the nuclear-armed North Korea. The US has 28,500 troops stationed in South Korea. Trump has taken a tough stance against the North. He has repeatedly threatened Pyongyang with military action, recently saying that the era of strategic patience with the peninsular country was over. Tensions have been building on the Korean Peninsula following a series of nuclear and missile tests by Pyongyang as well as threats of war and personal insults traded between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. North Korea has been under a raft of United Nations sanctions since 2006 over its nuclear tests and missile launches. Pyongyang has firmly defended its weapons programs as a deterrent against hostile policies of the US and its regional allies, including South Korea. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address S Korea Mulling Acquisition of US Nuclear Submarines, Spy Satellites - Reports Sputnik News 19:56 07.11.2017(updated 19:57 07.11.2017) It seems that the US president's tour to Asia-Pacific is going to result in a number of deals on arms supplies in the wake of escalated tensions on the Korean Peninsula. TOKYO (Sputnik) Trump's visit to South Korea and his meeting with President Moon Jae-in has focused on the conflict with Pyongyang, touching upon a possible acquisition of US weapons by Seoul, according to Yonhap news agency reported, citing a source in the South Korean president's administration. The list of weapons reportedly included US nuclear-powered submarines and spy satellites, with the parties being at the early stages of discussion. According to Yonhap, Seoul should count on a technology transfer or a different form of cooperation since the United States has never delivered spy satellites or nuclear-powered submarines to other countries. Trump is currently on his trip to Asia focused primarily on the settlement of the North Korean crisis, which began in Japan on Sunday, with the US president also discussing the US arms supplies to the country during his meeting with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Apart from the latest Trump's trip to South Korea, which has prompted already protests, the tour will also include visits to China and Vietnam, where the US president is set to attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, finishing his journey in the Philippines on November 12-14. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Russia's Communists Mark Centenary Of Bolshevik Revolution, Kremlin Plays It Down Tom Balmforth November 07, 2017 MOSCOW -- Thousands of communist supporters from around the world rallied in downtown Moscow on November 7 to mark the centenary of the Bolshevik Revolution as the Kremlin avoided commemorating the tumultuous event. Carrying red flags, chanting communist slogans, and preaching socialism, demonstrators from dozens of countries braved brisk weather as they marched down a main street, passed the State Duma, and rallied in Revolution Square with pro-Soviet songs blaring from loudspeakers and police looking on. "Today representatives of countries came from all the continents: 131 parties spoke at forums in Leningrad [the Soviet-era name for St. Petersburg] and in Moscow. We passed a resolution on uniting the great powers of socialist triumph," Russian Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov told the rally. "And I am absolutely sure that the banner of socialism, the sun of socialism will again rise over Russia and the whole world. It will give an example to communist China which has become the leading power in the world thanks to the ideas of great October." The embalmed corpse of Vladimir Lenin still lies on view in a mausoleum just outside the Kremlin walls on Red Square, but the government of President Vladimir Putin -- who has criticized the Bolshevik leader and warned against political upheaval -- did little to mark the anniversary. The communist celebrations come on a momentous anniversary that is going largely unmarked by President Vladimir Putin's government and has drawn shrugs from many citizens of a country that was thrown into upheaval 100 years ago and plunged into seven decades of repressive, often tumultuous communist rule. The Russian authorities focused instead on remembrance of World War II, staging a military parade on Red Square to mark the anniversary of a 1941 parade after which soldiers went off to the front. Veterans and others laid wreaths at the eternal flame and the tomb of the unknown soldier by the Kremlin walls. Although it is the second-largest party in the lower house of parliament after Kremlin-controlled United Russia, the Communist Party (KPRF) wields little real influence today and votes with Putin on most major issues. "All my life I have supported the Communist idea. There is no other idea that could unite in such a way, to make a man a person," said Mikhail Veseldin, an 87-year-old pensioner. The November 7 centenary of the revolution -- which ushered in more than seven decades of repressive single-party rule from Moscow across a huge swath of Europe and Asia -- came nearly 26 years after the Soviet Union's collapse. Commemorations of the event were also held in other former Soviet republics such as Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Ukraine. Kyiv is deeply at odds with Moscow over Russia's armed takeover of Crimea and its support for separatists in a war that has killed more than 10,000 people in eastern Ukraine since April 2014. "I don't live far from here, but I would go anywhere under any circumstances to be here," said Svetlana Panova, a Moscow pensioner. "So many young people, it's great! So many foreigners!" Analysts say that Putin, who says he has brought stability to Russia and is widely expected to seek and secure a new six-year term in a March 2018 election -- but would be barred from running again in 2024 -- has no interest in drawing attention to a momentous piece of past political turmoil. Putin, president or prime minister since 1999, has sought to instill patriotism in Russians by drawing on nostalgia for the Soviet era and achievements -- such as its huge contribution to the World War II victory over Nazi Germany -- as well as the grandeur of the tsarist and Imperial eras. The former KGB officer once called the Soviet collapse the "greatest geopolitical catastrophe" of the 20th century. But he has also criticized Lenin, saying in 2016 that the Bolshevik leader had planted a "time bomb" under the Russian state. And in 2005, he replaced the November 7 holiday marking the revolution with a November 4 holiday called National Unity Day, which celebrates a defeat of Polish forces in 1612. November 7 is now a working day for most Russians. With reporting by RIA Novosti and TASS Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-bolshevik-revolution- centenary-kremlin-putin/28839675.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 Russian Long-Range Weapons Proved Effective in Syria - Shoigu Sputnik News 13:00 07.11.2017(updated 14:28 07.11.2017) Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu has held a ministerial meeting, discussing a range of issues from modern Russian weapons to military bases in the Arctic region. MOSCOW (Sputnik) Russian aviation equipment and high-precision long-range weapons demonstrated their effectiveness during combat actions in Syria, according to Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu. "I shall note that new weapons demonstrated their high effectiveness and reliability during the combat actions in Syria. First of all, this is aviation equipment and high-precision long-range weapons," he said at a ministerial meeting. Modern Weapons Available For the Russian Military According to the minister, the share of modern weapons in service with the Russian Armed Forces has increased up to 58.9 percent and should reach at least 70 percent by 2020. "The gained momentum will allow the Defense Ministry to fulfill the task of reaching a 70 percent share of the armed forces' equipment with modern military hardware by 2020," Shoigu said. The State Armaments Program is worked out every five years, and the previous plan was drawn up for the 2011-2020 period. The plan foresaw investment of around 20 trillion rubles ($351 billion) over that time period, 2.6 trillion ($46 billion) of which went to ground forces and paratroopers, 4.5 trillion ($79 billion) to the air force and 4.7 trillion ($83 billion) to the navy. Military Facilities in the Arctic Commenting on Russia's military facilities in the Arctic, the top official said that two military facilities on the Franz Josef Land archipelago and New Siberian Islands would be commissioned at the end of this year, which would allow, if necessary, a rapid build up of troops there. "This will allow us to exercise control over the Northern Sea Route, ensure the security of Russia's economic activities in the Arctic region, and, if necessary, to rapidly build up groupings of troops in this strategic area." Earlier this year, Sergei Shoigu said that Russia's military infrastructure in the Arctic would be fully developed by 2020. The minister added that Russia was expanding trade and exploration activities in the Arctic by building transport and energy production infrastructure, as well as developing the Northern Sea Route linking Europe and Asia. Sputnik NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Assad's aide: US, Turkish troops presence on Syrian soil illegal Iran Press TV Tue Nov 7, 2017 10:32PM President Bashar al-Assad's top aide has stressed that the presence of US and Turkish troops on Syrian soil is illegal and that will be dealt with invaders. Bouthaina Shaaban, who made the remarks during a televised interview on Tuesday, also noted that the Syrian government would never give up on the city of Raqqah. On October 17, the US-backed Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) announced that it had defeated Daesh in Raqqah and three days later said that it had fully recaptured the city from the terror group, following a military operation, which was launched in July without Damascus' approval. At the time, the US-backed SDF also said in a provocative statement that the city would be part of a system of "federal government" in the country's north. The Syrian military has not so far engaged the SDF, which has reportedly shelled the positions of government troops on several occasions in recent weeks. Shaaban noted that the SDF should take what happened recently in Iraqi Kurdistan as "a lesson." On September 25, a referendum on secession of the Kurdistan region was held despite strong opposition from Iraqi authorities, the international community, and Iraq's neighboring countries, especially Turkey and Iran. Following the vote, Baghdad imposed a ban on direct international flights to the Kurdish region and called for a halt to its independent crude oil sales. On October 12, an Iraqi government spokesman said Baghdad had set a series of conditions that the KRG needed to meet before any talks on the resolution of the referendum crisis could start. On October 16, Iraqi federal forces retook control of the Kurdish-held city of Kirkuk. NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Russian FM denies postponing Syrian peace congress Iran Press TV Tue Nov 7, 2017 05:47PM Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has denied postponing an upcoming "Syrian Congress" which would bring together Syria's warring sides in the Russian city of Sochi. "This congress is being prepared now," Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters on Tuesday. "No one has postponed it because the date of the congress has not been officially announced," he added. The seventh round of peace talks between the Syrian government and the opposition was held in the Kazakh capital city of Astana in late October, with the three guarantor states agreeing on the Russian initiative for holding the Syrian Congress. The Russian Foreign Ministry's website had initially set November 18 as the date for the event, listing 33 Syrian organizations to take part at the conference. Russia says the key task of the event is to pave the way for constitutional reforms. On Sunday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said the Kremlin had told Ankara it was postponing the event. In reaction, Lavrov said on Tuesday that Moscow was in touch with Turkey, Iran, the Persian Gulf nations and other countries to set the agenda and date for the congress. Russia is also consulting the Syrian government and a number of opposition forces as well as the UN special envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura, Lavrov said. He pointed to some Syrian opposition groups' refusal to hold talks with President Bashar al-Assad's government at the congress, but noted that the existing feedback is "rather positive." Members of Syrian opposition High Negotiations Committee and the Turkey-based Syrian National Coalition (SNC) opposed Russia's initiative, saying the plan seeks to circumvent the UN efforts to mediate Syrian peace talks in Geneva. They stressed that they will not participate in any negotiations with Damascus outside Geneva or without UN sponsorship. Lavrov called on global players to redouble efforts to find a diplomatic solution to the six-year war as the Syrian government is getting closer to victory in its anti-terror campaign. "As far as the Syrian conflict is concerned, the political process is becoming ever more important," he said. "The fight against terror in Syria is coming to an end. There should not be any breaks in the efforts of the international community." NEWS LETTER Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list Enter Your Email Address Coreophotonics, an Israeli maker of dual-lens camera technology, is suing Apple. The company filed a lawsuit in the US District Court in Northern California, where Cupertino is located. Coreophotonics claims that Apple is using its tech in the iPhone 7 Plus and the iPhone 8 Plus. There is no mention of iPhone X in the filing, probably due to the device being launched last Friday. Coreophotonics demonstrated the dual camera technology last year at MWC in Barcelona. It showed how images from both sensors could be combined for a more detailed picture, including an optical zoom up to 5x. In the complaint, the Israelis say they received many encouraging reports and positive feedback from Apple, but couldnt go the distance and reach a patent agreement. Apple allegedly knew about the patents, but their lead negotiator said it would take years and millions of dollars before reaching an agreement, a spokesman of Coreophotonics noted. Back in 2015, Apple acquired LinX Imaging, another Israeli company that specializes in multi-aperture camera equipment for mobile devices. Apple most likely used their technologies in its three dual-cam devices. Via In the US, Sprint and US Cellular are already offering the LG V30+, and now T-Mobile is getting ready to join in the action. The magenta carrier has just announced that the V30+ will become available in limited quantities on November 17. You'll be able to buy one for $130 upfront, then followed by 24 monthly installments of $30. That is, of course, if you use TMo's interest-free Equipment Installment Plan. If you'd rather pay the full sum at once when you purchase the phone, know that you'll have to part with $850. The V30+ is basically just a vanilla V30 - but with 128GB of built-in storage instead of 64. T-Mobile says it ships with a "premium headset" in the box. The phone will work with the carrier's "super-advanced LTE network", including the 600 MHz band. Source Today, Twitter has lifted the 140-character limit for its general users to 280. The micro-blogging platform first tested the new limit on a select group of Twitter users, particularly those with large amounts of followers and celebrities. The test period took place over about six weeks, during which Twitter has collected some interesting data. Only 5% of tweets sent were longer than 140 characters while only 2% were over 190. Mind you, this data was collected before the limit was changed for the vast majority of Twitter users. Wed be interested to learn if well see long tweets all the time, or if people will just keep it short and sweet as theyve been doing since Twitter launched. Source: Twitter Twitters reasoning for the increase in character limits is to bring more users who want a bigger canvas to express themselves more easily. The limit is not being raised for Japanese, Korean, and Chinese users because these languages has much denser characters in their languages, thus not requiring them to cram very much. Anyway, those whose limits have been raised will see a new circular character limit indicator, which replaces the digital counter. Source Yesterday Xiaomi Mi Mix 2 was introduced in Spain and now it lands in another European country. The 6 GB RAM + 64 GB storage phone is sold in Netherlands for 599 and could be purchased unlocked by retailer Belsimpel. The phone can also be purchased with a prepaid plan or with a subscription. Belsimpel offers deals with all the providers in Netherlands which include purchasing the Mi Mix 2 with a monthly payment plan, instead of paying it all upfront. The delivery takes 2-4 working days. The Xiaomi Mi Mix 2 is the second device available for purchase from the Chinese manufacturer. A month ago the Xiaomi Mi A1 also arrived with a 260 price tag. Thanks for the tip, Clay! Source (in Dutch) Scott Capper Arriving at Blanchardstown Court in relation to a Incident in Finglas Seven men have appeared in court charged with violent disorder following a major public order incident in a pub in Finglas last month. The men did not apply for bail and were remanded in custody to Cloverhill Prison for a week. They are David Mulvey (35), Gerard Hogg (33) and Robert Gaynor (27), all of Berryfield Drive, Finglas; Dean Thomas (26), of Glenties Drive, Finglas; Scott Capper (28), of Cappagh Green, Finglas; Paul Brannigan (28), of Tuiterath, Balrath, Navan, Co Meath; and Dean Smith (24), of Scribblestown Green, Finglas. Fight The men appeared before Blanchardstown District Court yesterday charged with violent disorder at The Cardiff Inn, Cardiffsbridge Road, Finglas, on October 19. They were charged following a fight in a pub involving at least 10 men. Six of the accused had made no reply to the charges after caution. Mr Brannigan told gardai: "It's b*****ks, it's not me." Their lawyers told Judge Miriam Walsh that the men were not making applications for bail but would be applying on the next date. Gardai had serious objections to bail, the court heard, and Judge Walsh remanded the accused in custody to appear before Cloverhill District Court next Tuesday. The men were arrested at various locations in the Finglas area early on Monday morning and were taken to garda stations in Finglas, Ballymun and Clondalkin, where they were detained for questioning and were subsequently charged with violent disorder. Mr Hogg was first to be brought before the court. Sgt Shane Mc- Cartan gave evidence of arresting him at his home shortly before 6am on Monday. Sgt McCartan said Mr Hogg had been detained for questioning and charged by Sgt Nicola Brady. Tracksuit Defence lawyer Jennifer Jackson said Mr Hogg, who is unemployed and on social welfare, would not be applying for bail. Dressed in a grey tracksuit, the bearded defendant did not address the court during the short hearing. Next to appear was Mr Mulvey. Sgt McCartan said the accused had been arrested at his home at 6.19am and taken to Finglas Garda Station for questioning. He was later charged and had made no reply to the charge after caution, said Sgt McCartan. Defence solicitor Kelly Breen said Mr Mulvey would not be applying for bail at this stage. The salt-and-pepper haired defendant did not address the court. Mr Gaynor was the third of the accused to appear, and Ms Breen said he had consented to a week's remand in custody. Mr Thomas and Mr Capper agreed to the same terms. Mr Smith appeared wearing an orange T-shirt and grey shorts. Judge Walsh told him that shorts were not appropriate attire for court. Defence solicitor Simon Fleming explained that the accused had been arrested at his home early on Monday morning and was unprepared for court. Sgt Gavin Ross said that, when Mr Brannigan had been charged, he replied after caution: "It's b*****ks, it's not me." Defence lawyer Aoife O'Leary said Mr Brannigan would not be applying for bail. He was on social welfare and Judge Walsh assigned solicitor Tony Collier on free legal aid. The men have not indicated any pleas to the charges. 'Donal Ryan followed his pupil into her bedroom, where he lay down and patted the woman's bed, signalling for her to join him (stock photo) A "creepy" 74-year-old driving instructor has pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a 22-year-old woman during a stop-off on a driving lesson. Donal Ryan followed his pupil into her bedroom, where he lay down and patted the woman's bed, signalling for her to join him. The student nurse "froze" and was "shocked" and "very startled" at Ryan's actions during their 11th lesson together, Insp Tom Kennedy told Killaloe District Court. She had gone to her family home to collect a couple of items, only for the pensioner to follow her in uninvited. "Ryan was lying down on one side of her bed and patting the other side with his right hand, and she took that as an invitation to get on to the bed," said Insp Kennedy. She left her bedroom, but Ryan caught her from behind and wrapped his arms around her. She wriggled free, but he grabbed her from behind again. Ryan had told her "you're so gorgeous, you're so gorgeous" and that she made him excited, which she had found "creepy". He then grabbed her breasts with both hands and squeezed them through her clothing. The woman felt violated and said that what had happened on November 15 last year was a "horrible experience". Judge Patrick Durcan described the case as extremely serious and adjourned sentencing to Ennis District Court today. During the incident, Insp Kennedy said the woman was feeling inner panic but was showing outer calm. When she had met her boyfriend, she burst into tears and made a complaint to gardai. Ryan, of St Conlon's Road, Nenagh, Co Tipperary, had previously made a number of inappropriate comments to the woman, including telling her she had lovely legs and he was feeling like 21. apologises On another occasion, the woman had to take off her boots as they weren't suitable for driving and, when putting them back on, Ryan told her the neighbours might think she was getting re-dressed. Ryan's solicitor, Jennifer Donovan, said her client had worked for 22 years in Nenagh without any incident of this nature and was now retired and drawing the state pension. "He has no previous convictions for any type of offence and absolutely unreservedly apologises to the woman," she said. Ms Donovan said Ryan had only appreciated the effect of his actions after reading the woman's statements. "He is a very tactile person by nature," she said. Her client had co-operated fully with gardai. Emma Murphy arriving at court to read a victim impact statement after Francis Usanga was found guilty of assaulting her A TV fitness expert who punched the mother of his children in the face has objected to her victim impact statement, which his lawyer described as "outlandish" and "untrue". Francis Usanga (31) was in court for sentencing for the assault on his ex-partner, model Emma Murphy, when his solicitor raised objections to the statement she handed in. Judge Bryan Smyth agreed to adjourn the case for two weeks after the defence argued the document, which was not read out to the court, was "prejudicial" to Usanga. Last month, the former RTE Today Show fitness guru was found guilty of assault causing harm to Ms Murphy outside his gym, FX Fitness, in Santry on July 3, 2015. Irrelevant Usanga, of Lanesboro, Finglas, had pleaded not guilty, claiming he only pushed her with an open hand "in self-defence". The case was due to be finalised at Dublin District Court yesterday, but defence solicitor Michael Hanahoe said he had seen Ms Murphy's victim impact statement and did not think the judge should read it. He said its contents were "absolutely irrelevant" and indicated matters that were "utterly prejudicial and untrue". Judge Smyth looked at the statement and said it seemed to refer to other issues. "What the court is concerned with is what is before the court and nothing else," the judge said. "The victim impact statement can't be used to bring in other matters." A State solicitor accepted Ms Murphy "may have strayed slightly" in her statement. Mr Hanahoe said that although the judge had not read the statement thoroughly, it had been read sufficiently to be prejudicial. Judge Smyth said he was not accepting the written statement. He told Mr Hanahoe he had "hardly read any of it" and said he was not happy with it but was going to disregard it. The State solicitor said Ms Murphy could give oral evidence instead. Mr Hanahoe said he wanted to consider his position. It was a matter of whether the court had been prejudiced by the statement and if it could proceed, he said. There were matters in the statement that could alter the court's view of the nature of the case, he added. Judge Smyth said a victim impact statement was "not carte blanche". Usanga did not address the court. During last month's hearing, Ms Murphy said she went to Usanga's gym with her two young children in the car to talk to him about him "cheating on me again". Ms Murphy asked Usanga if she could use his phone and, after a conversation, she told him "you cheated on me again" and threw it in his direction, she said. "He punched me in the face," she told the court, saying his fist hit her left eye. The court heard a Facebook video Ms Murphy shared after the assault went viral and Usanga claimed this was done in an attempt to "destroy" him. Gerry Hutch, whose gang have been feuding with Kinahan's A garda manhunt has been launched for a dangerous Kinahan cartel mobster who is wanted in relation to an elaborate murder plot that was foiled in the capital. On Monday night, heavily armed detectives from the Emergency Response Unit (ERU) intercepted a car in the north inner city and seized a loaded Beretta pistol fitted with a silencer. Four well-known criminals were arrested for conspiring to murder violent drug dealer Gary Hanley (28), who has close links to the Hutch organised crime gang. The Herald can exclusively reveal that: - Gardai are still attempting to track down a 33-year-old cartel member who they suspect played a prominent role in orchestrating the murder plot - The Blackrock home of a 39-year-old cartel associate, who is suspected of involvement in the conspiracy but hasn't been arrested, was searched - A number of the Hutch mob's "heavy hitters", who are among the most dangerous criminals in the capital, made contact with the intended target yesterday and have threatened to strike back against the cartel - Extra security was yesterday put in place at the garda stations where the arrested men were being questioned, over fears that Hutch associates would attempt an attack - The surveillance operation that led to the arrests had been ongoing for several months and involved the monitoring of cars and houses by specialist detectives. As part of Monday night's massive bust, 10 properties were searched and seven vehicles were also seized to be forensically examined. Gardai were last night attempting to track down the well-known member of the Kinahan cartel who is suspected of playing a prominent role in the murder plot. This 33-year-old criminal has been involved with organised crime groups since his teens and is suspected of carrying out a number of attacks for the Kinahan cartel. These include last year's attempted murder of John Hutch (64), the brother of Gerry 'The Monk' Hutch, who escaped injury after being targeted at his inner-city home. However, a source last night revealed there were fears that the wanted man has fled the country. "Attempts are being made to track down this thug, who regularly returns to the jurisdiction from abroad," the source said. Searched It has also emerged that a 39-year-old man, who resides in the leafy Blackrock area, is suspected of being involved in the murder plot. He has been linked to the Kinahan cartel for a number of years, and his home was searched as part of the probe into Monday night's foiled murder. Last night, detectives were continuing to question the four well-known Dublin criminals for allegedly conspiring to murder Hutch gang associate Hanley (28). Those detained include a volatile 38-year-old hitman for hire, who was only recently released from prison. He was arrested in his car near his family home in Christchurch, Dublin 8, on Monday night. The Herald revealed at the time he was let out of jail 16 people had to be given security advice because of his release, which was the subject of a major garda alert. This man is already a suspect in a string of gangland murders but has barely any previous convictions, and was cleared of charges in a gruesome murder case. Senior sources said at the time of his release that gardai had serious concerns the evil mobster may offer himself up as a hitman for hire for the gangsters involved in the bloody Hutch-Kinahan feud - and so it has proved. Also arrested was a 35-year-old criminal who is considered a high-ranking member of the Kinahan cartel. This individual was apprehended at his apartment in the south inner city by members of the Armed Support Unit (ASU). Investigators suspect that he was the person responsible for organising the hit. It emerged last night that the gangster has become an "organiser" within the cartel's operations - a serious role in which he would have very little experience. Although not arrested at the scene, this "highly dangerous" duo were linked to the conspiracy through mobile phone intelligence and other surveillance gathered by detectives. The volatile hitman's cousin - a 23-year-old criminal who survived an attempt on his life in west Dublin four years ago - was arrested on Philipsburgh Avenue in Fairview allegedly in possession of the firearm. This Ballyfermot criminal has been involved in gang violence since he was in his early teens. He was travelling with a 36-year-old career criminal from Drimnagh, who was only recently released from prison after serving a sentence for explosives and firearms offences. Security This drug addict was previously busted with the 35-year-old high-ranking cartel member. Security has been increased at a number of Dublin garda stations as detectives continue to question those arrested in relation to the foiled murder. Members of the Garda Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau (DOCB) have been called in amid fears that associates of the intended target could attempt an attack on the suspects. Assistant Commissioner John O'Driscoll, who heads Special Crimes Operations, said the operation was one of the most significant carried out in the history of the State which didn't involve subversives. The senior garda also paid tribute to the officers who were involved in Monday night's arrests. "Clearly with an intervention like this there is a serious level of risk assessment that takes place. You have members of An Garda Siochana putting their own lives at risk," said Mr O'Driscoll. And he warned of more arrests. "There are people whose doors we will be knocking at, who we will be arresting as part of this," he said. This is the intended target of Monday night's foiled gang feud murder bid, who was in a pub when a hit team attempting to kill him were intercepted by armed gardai. Senior sources have revealed Gary Hanley became a prime target for the Kinahan cartel after they received information that he was directing operations for the rival Hutch mob in the north-inner city. The career criminal has risen through the ranks of the Hutch gang since their deadly feud with the Kinahans began in 2015, and is now considered their "number two" drugs dealer in the area they control. Hanley (28), originally from North Clarence Street in north-inner city Dublin, was officially warned by gardai last month of a credible threat against his life but refused to leave the capital despite being advised to do so. Revenge He is closely connected to main players within the Hutch organisation, and sources revealed he received messages of support yesterday from many key members of the gang. Among them were his close pal and feared thug Jason 'Buda' Molyneaux (26), and the Hutch gang's main enforcers. Hanley's suspected drug supplier is a 35-year-old criminal who has been a key member of the Hutch mob for years. Gardai are concerned about revenge attacks after the high-profile arrest operation. Associates of Hanley are said to be "adamant" they will hit back after he was minutes away from being shot dead on Monday. Among these are a criminal duo, aged 43 and 41, who have been out of prison since 2013, having served sentences together after being busted in a major garda surveillance operation. One is classified as one of the most dangerous "guns for hire" in the country. A two-man hit squad was intercepted by armed gardai at Philipsburgh Avenue, Fairview, at around 8pm on Monday as the hitmen attempted to make their way to Hanley's home in Marino. It is not clear if they knew their intended target was not in fact at the property. Hanley has more than 30 previous convictions for offences including drug dealing, serious assault and other crimes. He was once brutally assaulted in Mountjoy Prison by a convicted killer. Now a feared enforcer, he was convicted of an armed robbery when he was only 15. Sources say that he has "risen through the ranks" within the Hutch gang after being released from his latest period in jail around a year and a half ago. That related to a four-year sentence he received in 2013 for having cannabis resin for sale or supply at the Alfie Byrne complex on April 10, 2009. While serving his time, Hanley was attacked with a sharpened spoon in Wheatfield Prison and stabbed in the head, face and neck. Stabbing He had previously clashed with his attackers in the prison and had been placed in the "at risk" category by jail officials as he faced threats from up to 20 different inmates. Ironically, while behind bars Hanley clashed with a number of inmates with close links to the Hutch mob. He was previously jailed for stabbing a woman in the face with a set of keys while she was holding her baby. He was sentenced to four years in prison after being convicted of assaulting the woman causing her harm and for threatening to kill or cause her serious injury at Clontarf in Dublin on March 15, 2007. The victim needed 20 stitches to her face and was left with two permanent scars from the horrific attack. She had been outside the Dart station when Hanley jumped out of a car and ran towards her. He pulled her to the ground by the hair and stabbed her several times above her left eye and below her ear. While carrying out the attack, he called her a "bitch" and told her: "Next time you will get it in the heart." Transport Minister Shane Ross has been accused of treating as "trivial" the Irish Rail strike that left 155,000 rail passengers stranded yesterday. Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin said Mr Ross had promised a national transport forum during a bus strike in the summer, but nothing had been done. Taoiseach Leo Varadkar insisted the rail strike will be resolved by the state industrial relations machinery, and that pay disputes in the CIE group always appeared "to require a few days of strike" before they could be fixed. However, Mr Martin said Mr Ross had neglected the transport system and had an antipathy towards the CIE group of rail and bus companies. He added that an extra 103m was needed by Irish Rail to keep the standards of lines and carriages up to date. He said the workers had not had a pay rise in 10 years and did not want to be on strike. Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams also accused the minister of having shown no interest in the issue. "Perhaps he's minister for North Korea in his own head," he said. "I suppose a rail strike like this is a very trivial matter for him." The Taoiseach said he appreciated that people were very badly affected, as were rail staff and businesses operating in and around railway stations. However, he insisted that this strike "would be resolved like all other disputes". "It will be resolved in the normal way, involving the auspices of the state industrial relations apparatus, including the Labour Relations Commission and, if necessary, the Labour Court," said Mr Varadkar. It comes as a union official hinted that the pay dispute could spill over to Dublin Bus and Bus Eireann. Avert A further three days of strikes are already planned - the next one next Tuesday - with no indication of the two sides coming together for talks to avert them. Siptu has said there is a "very real possibility" that more strike days could be added next month and these would likely be of a "greater duration" than yesterday's 24-hour strike. The union will make a decision at a meeting reviewing its industrial relations campaign early next month. However, Siptu division organiser Greg Ennis also raised the possibility that bus drivers may take some action in support of their rail colleagues. Speaking to the Herald from the picket line at Drogheda train station yesterday, he said: "A lot of bus drivers between Dublin Bus and Bus Eireann are concerned at the intransigence of the minister and the Department of Transport and how they are dealing with their brothers and sisters in this dispute. "As of now, this is purely a dispute between Irish Rail workers and their employer, but there is growing concern." Earlier this year, during the lengthy strike by Bus Eireann drivers, some train drivers who worked out of combined bus and rail depots refused to cross the picket lines. However, Dermot O'Leary, general secretary of the National Bus and Rail Union, insisted that bus drivers in his union would not be taking part in any industrial action in support of their train driver colleagues. When asked about the possibility, he said:"Let me be very, very strong in stating categorically, in no circumstances will I be supporting anyone who decides to do that." Police Accountability Boards starting work in most Maryland counties Mandated by state law after the killing of George Floyd, Police Accountability Boards have begun work in the majority of Maryland counties. L ondons progress is fuelled by constant evolution. For most of the citys boroughs, this goes hand in hand with regeneration. Whether its a minimal uplift in a well-heeled district or a significant overhaul in an up-and-coming area, the phenomenon is all around us. For Custom House, one of the far eastern stops set to benefit from being on the Elizabeth line when it opens in a years time, the base fundamentals have never looked better. Average local property values are about 318,000, still affordable despite a 52 per cent increase in the last five years and, once Crossrail is up and running, the commute into central London and across the city will be slashed. The current 24-minute journey to Liverpool Street will drop to just 10, while it will take 20 minutes to get to Paddington and 45 to get to Heathrow compared to the current times of 42 and 71 minutes respectively. This makes the district an attractive investment opportunity. SHAPING THE FUTURE There can be no denying, however, that E16 has not always been top of home buyers lists. Indeed, many Londoners have never heard of it. Once home to thousands of docks employees, the area along with neighbouring Canning Town was made up of dreary acres of post-war council homes that have done little to help elevate it to the dizzying heights of some of its nearby east London neighbours. Custom House is in the heart of Newham, which saw an overall uplift in property prices of 21 per cent in the 12 months to September last year, making it Londons fastest-rising borough. Smashing journey times: integrating with the existing DLR station, Custom House Elizabeth line, set to open in a year, is sparking huge development interest in an area already getting 3.7bn regeneration But Custom House has remained largely overlooked unlike Stratford to the north and Silvertown to the south. Industrial pollution, a hangover from the docks days, has made it unattractive to developers. All of that is set to change. Crossrail will significantly boost the 3.7 billion regeneration programme for Canning Town and Custom House, currently being run by Newham council. By 2024, the proposal is for 12,000 new homes in the area, along with two revitalised town centres, open spaces for leisure activity, improved local facilities, investment in infrastructure and the creation of thousands of new jobs. Add to this the fact that new research by developer Notting Hill Sales has found that 90 per cent of Londoners would consider moving to a less-established area of the city to find a more affordable home, and Custom House where property prices are currently just under 50 per cent below the London average of 658,000 starts to look like a no-brainer. ATTRACTIVE NEW HOMES Swathes of new development in Custom House and Canning Town are already providing attractive new homes. Flats at Countryside Properties East City Point start at 345,000 for a one-bedroom home, from 405,000 for two-bedrooms and from 580,000 for a three-bedroom apartment. Call 020 7473 1198. From 107,500: 25 per cent of a two-bedroom flat at Royal Albert Wharf. Notting Hill Sales Hallsville Quarter, the 600 million town centre being created as part of the Custom House and Canning Town regeneration project, has one- and two-bedroom flats for sale off-plan in the 18-storey Discovery Tower from 440,000 and 550,000 respectively. Notting Hill Housing has a number of projects with shared-ownership flats available. Opening late next year, prices at Traders Quarter, with 24-hour concierge, on-site swimming pool and fitness suite, start from 96,250 for 25 per cent of a one-bedroom flat worth 385,000, and from 131,250 for a 25 per cent share of a 525,000 two-bedroom apartment. From 96,250: a 25 per cent share of a one-bedroom flat at Traders Quarter, Royal Wharf E16. Notting Hill Sales At Rathbone Market, two-bedroom flats start at 106,250 for 25 per cent of a home with a market value of 425,000, and from 130,000 for 25 per cent of a 520,000 flat. And at nearby Royal Albert Wharf, prices start at 107,500 based on a 25 per cent share of the full market value of 430,000 for a two-bedroom apartment. IVE GOT MY OWN HOME FOR THE SAME AS I PAID IN RENT. I LOVE IT First-time buyer Tom OConnor, 31, has lived and worked in London for years and knew that when the time came to put down roots, he wanted to stay in the capital. He sold his car when he moved to Stratford two years ago, so he wanted a home near a station. Through shared ownership with Notting Hill Sales he was able to buy a new two-bedroom flat at Royal Albert Wharf in E16 which is set to benefit from the opening of the nearby Custom House Crossrail station in December next year. "I love it": first-time buyer Tom OConnor was able to buy a new two-bedroom flat at Royal Albert Wharf in E16 through shared ownership / Juliet Murphy He says: Id been renting with a friend in Stratford since 2015 and it was costing us 2,000 a month. But when I was on my own I figured out that shared ownership was the best chance I had to buy my own home. My friends and family live in east London so I wanted to stay in the area and Royal Albert Wharf really appealed to me. I was astonished at how peaceful the area was when I first arrived it feels like a little village centred around the water. I registered my name and was able to buy a two-bedroom apartment overlooking the water, which I absolutely adore. My monthly outgoings are around the same as I was paying in rent but I get so much more for my money. And its all mine. Zambia, a jewel strategically located in the heart of Southern Africa continues to poise itself as an auspicious destination and it is still largely untouched by tourism exploits. This naturally beautiful country will be the Convention & Culture Partner of ITB Berlin 2018. "With Zambia as Convention & Culture Partner we will get to know a fascinating country with untouched nature ", said David Ruetz, Head of ITB Berlin. "It has good prospects as a tourism destination and is currently developing a highly sustainable tourism infrastructure. We look forward to highlighting the attractions of Zambia as a travel destination in 2018." Commenting on this partnership with ITB Berlin, Zambia's Minister of Tourism and Arts Hon. Charles Banda said that his country stands out as one of the prime tourism destinations in Africa offering a wealth of natural tourism assets colourful cultures, waterfalls, lakes and rivers holding about 35 per cent of Southern Africa's total natural water resource, 'wildlife protected areas' occupying about 10 per cent of the country's total land area, and a tropical climate a passport to sunshine almost throughout the year. The Minister adds that the promotion of Zambia as the Convention and Culture partner of ITB Berlin 2018 is in line with his ministry's vision 2030 which is "A destination of choice with unique features thriving on well conserved natural resources, cultural heritage, and creative industries that significantly contribute to employment creation, sustainable economic growth and poverty reduction". Zambia, although landlocked, leaves breath-taking impressions because of its sheer size and its abundant natural resource wealth and strategic location lying in the tropical belt of Southern Africa covering an area space of 752,614 square kilometres or 290,586 square miles, the country strategically positions itself as an emerging and among the fastest growing economies in Africa and is still one of the largest copper producing countries of the world. Most travellers to Africa agree that Zambia is notably one of the best Safari Destinations and this can be attested through the various awards the camps and lodges including safari guides in the country have earned most of the time. Zambia boasts of 20 National Parks and 36 Game Management Areas and is renowned for walking safaris and is one of the best places to go on walking safaris in the world. In addition to safaris, the country boasts of the Victoria Falls, a magnificent site and such an awe to gaze upon. This is why it is One of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World and the only one on the list from Africa. Notably, most visitors to Zambia get drawn to the country by the waterfalls and wildlife based tourism products. However, this beautiful country also has a bountiful supply of other tourist attractions such as the rich cultural heritage, natural heritage sites, museums, monument sites, and rivers and lakes. The lakes and rivers are a major source of adventure and other playful yet invigorating activities, this is why Zambia is sometimes known as the adventure capital in the region. As the Convention & Cultural Partner of ITB Berlin, 2018, Zambia will present its many natural and cultural attractions to the visitors of ITB Berlin in entrance area 21. Its culture is diverse and vibrant. With 72 different tribes living in harmony, the destination boasts of over 50 traditional ceremonies annually. Zambia stills offers unspoiled nature marvelled with arable land for agricultural activities to support the livelihoods of the local people. At 53 years of independence, Zambia continues to lead by example as a beacon of peace in Southern Africa, an asset that counts as a very safe travel destination. Zambia has been endorsed by many travellers as one of the destinations with most friendly and welcoming people in the world. About ITB Berlin and the ITB Berlin Convention ITB Berlin 2023 will take place for trade visitors only from Tuesday, 7 to Thursday, 9 March. Since 1966, ITB Berlin has been the World's Leading Travel Trade Show. As in previous years, the internationally renowned ITB Berlin Convention will take place live parallel with the exhibition on the Berlin Exhibition Grounds, with selected sessions live-streamed on itb.com. In 2022 it took place as a virtual event on the brand's website itb.com and registered 60,700 attendees from 125 countries who took part in more than 100 sessions featuring 223 speakers. Taking place on one day, the Digital Business Day gave 2,500 attendees from 96 countries an opportunity to exchange views and do business virtually from anywhere in the world. International attendance was high, with 78 per cent of buyers and providers taking part from abroad. A total of 20,000 business contacts were made, resulting in 14,000 leads and 3,200 business meetings being arranged. As a virtual industry platform, the Digital Business Day augmented the ITB brand family and rounded off the trade show concept. In 2022, under the heading 'TRVLX by ITB', ITB Berlin is planning a series of B2B networking events in European markets the kick-off event took place in May in Georgia. Before the pandemic at ITB 2019, around 10,000 exhibitors from 181 countries displayed their products and services to some 160,000 visitors, including 113,500 trade visitors. Emanuel Hoger Press Spokesman and Press and Public Relations Director, Corporate Communication - Messe Berlin Group +49 30 3038-2270 Messe Berlin GmbH Global peer to peer rental giant AirBnB recently earned the top spot on CNBC's Disruptor 50 list, and in March of this year, after raising another $1B in funding, was estimated to be worth the same as traditional hotel groups Hilton and Hyatt combined. Despite legal issues in tourist hotspots including New York and Barcelona, the company remains extremely popular, putting traditional hotels on the ropes with it's wide range of homely and affordable accommodation options, as well as a level of automated convenience which appeals to more independant travellers. Nowadays, aside from being able to handcraft their own travel experiences, users can also search for, book, pay for and then even gain access to apartments with minimal interaction with hosts. To stay competitive and reduce staffing costs, leading hospitality providers are looking for ways they can also 'automate' parts their processes to streamline services to the fast changing tastes of modern guests. 'Robot' hotels have already been launched in Norway and Japan, however experts warn that if hotels automate too many of their functions, they risk sacrificing the personalized level of attention and comfort which many guests still desire. Today's hotel differentiation is on services. What can replace the joyous feeling of returning to a room which previously resembled a disaster zone to find it in pristine order, or being pampered like a king and queen when on your honeymoon? Here are three ways that hotels can automate without losing the personal touch which guests love so much: 1.Check-in We have all been there. You have had a long journey, spent hours on layovers, in cramped planes, buses and taxis, and finally arrive at your hotel only to be met with a queue to check in. All you want to do is have a shower and rest your weary head, but you have to wait, register your card and passport, and make small talk before you can finally reach the sanctuary of your room. Check-in and other mandatory hotel processes are often drivers towards more autonomous AirBnB experiences, where keypads and key drops streamline the process for guests when they arrive. But there are ways which hotels can automate this part of the process too. Tyler Craig, VP of NCR Corporation's travel business states, "Customers are used to ATMs at the bank instead of tellers, checking in for airplane flights online, and they are now looking for that same efficiency when they arrive at a hotel." Using automated check in systems offered by companies like Ariane, guests could notify the hotel of their estimated arrival time in advance, fill out passport registration, select a room, and even leave a credit card for deposit Uber style all via an app. Upon arrival, guests could either pick up a keycard from a person at reception, with an alternative machine after entering their login details, or be sent a key code to their smartphone using a service such as Openkey. However, it is important to offer both automated and traditional forms of check-in. Certain guests such as non-digital travellers or those with special requests or needs are more likely to appreciate speaking to a human representative who can welcome them, outline the facilities and have their bags sent to their room. It is also useful to have a human representative to handle any complaints or issues which may arise should something go awry with bookings or if someone has a complaint. We all know that tensions can run high after a long journey. 2. Room service / In-house services One of the major appeals for AirBnB users, is the ability to live more 'autonomously' when travelling by shopping for and cooking their own food. When you want a midnight snack, some late night drinks, or to indulge in an eyebrow raising amount of junk food, you don't have to worry about whether it is too late to call room service, or whether you will be looked down on for ordering a burger for breakfast. Recent studies show that consumers prefer to order through automated systems, and actually spend more money when doing so. Leading restaurants have found that orders made via digital apps were on average 20% higher than those taken by traditional cashiers. And despite the fact that for many of us being able to phone down for a snack, meal or simply a glass of wine is one of the luxuries which makes the hotel experience so endearing, when Chili's launched self-service tablets, they witnessed a 20% increase in dessert orders. People seem more comfortable letting their hair down when they don't have to announce their planned indulgences to another human being. Aside from offering the anonymity of remote ordering, room service via an app or tablet could make the process more comfortable for guests who are visiting a foreign country too. A recent study found that consumers often avoid ordering things from a menu when they are unsure of how to correctly pronounce the name of the item. The researchers concluded that consumers might fear being misunderstood or appearing unsophisticated to representatives. To tackle this, hospitality providers could automate in-house ordering by rolling out a mobile guest engagement solution which allows guests to request items and services from the comfort of their cellphone, or they could simply have an interactive menu system installed on devices in the guest's room. Marriott hotels and Hilton group have already rolled out similar concierge apps which allow users to interact with staff, request services or order room service from their cellphones. 3. Concierge Recent studies show that millennials crave unique travel experiences and tend to be turned off by the cookie-cutter in-house activities offered by many traditional hotels. As such, AirBnB, which seems to be doing a good job of staying one step ahead of millennial trends, launched its experience service which has been extremely successful in cities like New York. While some hotels are doing a better job of marketing in-house facilities towards millennial tastes such as the Grande Bretagne in Athens which advertises it's rooftop 'selfie spot', or the Mandarin Oriental which offers a 'selfies in Paris' package including a Mercedes and a personal driver there is still a lot of room for improvement. Millennials are looking for experiences which stretch much further than the hotel grounds. Rather than handing out leaflets and brochures, hotels need to automate the concierge process, to show users what is available in the locations surrounding them digitally. The Hilton group announced last year its plans to roll out robot concierges named Connie, powered by IBM's Watson. However, while many smaller hotel chains won't be able to afford IBM Watson, they could create something similar to the QT Hotels & Resorts Concierge app which can answer guests' questions, and also point them in the direction of local restaurants and activities. Harnessing the peer-to-peer power of sites like TripAdvisor or Yelp, hotels could create automated tour guide native apps for their surrounding areas based on reviews and location. These tools could allow guests to really delve into the areas around them and handcraft their own memorable experiences, and would allow hotels to use the data about guests' activities to create packages, partnerships and offers which could make these apps profitable for hotels and local business owners. AirBnB deserves its top spot on the disruptor list. In less than a decade the company has turned the hospitality industry on its head, and is forcing even the biggest players to adapt, or die. However, before hoteliers change their services too much to appeal to more independant travellers, they must be sure they are not changing the exact aspects which make us want to fork out extra for an amazing hotel experience. About Arrivedo Arrivedo, the first online platform with curated content of things to do around hotels, enables high profile hotels, such as Kimpton Hotels, Virgin Hotel in Chicago, WestHouse in New York (just three out of the 850 hotels working with Arrivedo), to organize their own Neighborhood Guide. Hotels can now compete with Airbnb to drive more traveler satisfaction and to attract travelers searching for accommodations with a local experience. Arrivedo is giving a voice to hotels as local hosts for a delightful welcome to guests. Hotels interested in using Arrivedo or want more information, they can contact [email protected] or go to Arrivedo.com to schedule a call with the Arrivedo Team. Alonso Franco Arrivedo After Meek Mills sentencing was announced, the rapper was shown an abundance of support by several members of the hip hop community. Jay-Z, T.I. and others were quick to show their support for the rapper on social media. Jay for example, was quick to point out the injustice in the sentencing, calling out the judge after the D.A. and the probation officer didnt recommend jail time for Meek. 50 Cent was another rapper that took to social media to speak on the case. However, he seemed to have a different point of view on whos responsible behind it. 50 Cent hit up social media earlier today to add his commentary to the Meek Mill situation. Unlike Jay-Z, the rapper felt there was someone else to blame for the sentence. 50 posted a cropped picture of Meeks lawyer, Brian McMonagle, walking to court with Meek Mill on his Instagram. The caption of the post read, So this is the guy that got meek a 2- 4 for riding a dirt bike? Putting the blame on the people that were trying to keep Meek Mill out of jail. Brian McMonagle is a well known Philadelphia defense lawyer. Hes the same defense attorney that led Bill Cosbys legal council during the sexual assault trial. The lawyer has also represented other entertainers and athletes in the past. Earlier in the year, both Meek and 50 finally put a rest to their lengthy internet feud. The two rappers had a long standing beef that lasted for the course of two years. Back in August, 50 Cent brought Meek out in Las Vegas to perform Dreams and Nightmares. It was the first time they were seen side by side after ending their feud. Meek previously revealed that he and 50 squashed their beef with each other prior to being seen on stage together. Despite the fact 50 didnt actually say it in his post, this is probably his way of showing some sort of support to Meek Mill right now. Check 50 Cents post below: Meek Mills recent prison sentence has a lot of people feeling some type of way, and for good reason. The rapper could potentially be going away for up to four years, and considering the dubious circumstances surrounding his relationship with the judge, the general consensus is that its an excessive verdict. And while fellow rappers like Jay-Z, T.I., and 50 Cent have already weighed in with their support for Meek, the Wins & Losses emcee is hoping to gain the attention of a potentially powerful ally Pennsylvania governor Tom Wolf. A petition has surfaced, addressing the governor in the hopes that he can do his part to reevaluate Meeks prison sentence. The petition opens with an write-up, referring to the sentence as harsh and undeserving. It proceeds to explain the important role Meek Mill plays within the community, stating the following in a passionate defense of the rapper: I felt the need to create a petition to reevaluate the charges, his impact in the community and the subsequent sentencing. More than just a celebrity or rapper, Meek Mill has been a powerful voice in the community for our youth. He has made positive contributions to many communities and programs, dedicating time and money to the cultivation of our youth and neighborhoods; even through his own adversities. He has continued to be dedicated and shown an immaculate work ethic, even at times when the system tried to prevent him from being able to tour, which is how he makes a living. You can read the entirety of the plea at Change.org, where you can also sign the petition. The aim is to show the amount of people who believe that the punishment was harsh and that him being imprisoned will be a disservice to the youth and community at large. Theres no telling if anything will come of this, but as of now, the petition already has over 25,000 signatures. Meek Mill / Tom Wolf Toronto rapper Shaqisdope has been busy occupying his fans with a bunch of new singles this year rather than hitting us with a project. In fact, the last project Shaqisdope released was last years Black Frames mixtape, but thankfully thats about to change here soon. After hitting us with a slew of singles this year, including King Push, Want 2 Win, Power & most recently Facts to name a few, Shaqisdope is about to switch things up on us and share a new self-titled EP on November 16th, which will serve as his first project of 2017. The ShaqIsDope EP is going to my best work to date .Thanks for being patient with me, it will be out on my birthday Nov 16, he shared on IG last month. But before it arrives next Thursday, the Toronto artist has a new song to share with us ahead of time called Ble$$ings, which was premiered by Zane Lowe on Beats 1 yesterday. Going in over production from Aaron Bow & Teddy Walton, Shaq brings the title to life & raps about the blessings in his life, which includes his new money & inking a deal with Adidas. Lot of things on my plate but the main goal was to eat so/ I just signed with Adidas had stripes but they gave me three more, he spits. The record surfaces just a couple weeks after Shaqisdope joined forces with the original Shaq, Shaquille ONeal, for a diss track aimed at Mans Not Hot rapper Big Shaq. Check that out right here if you missed it. Available on iTunes, take a listen to Blessings and let us know what you think! If youre a fan be sure to give Shaq a follow on Twitter @Shaqisdope for all his latest news and music updates. New EP drops next week, stay tuned. Quotable Lyrics: Im more concerned with the money I could give a damn about no relationship We grew up together so what? Yall know friendship could never make me rich USS Coronado departs Singapore after 14- month rotational deployment to Southeast Asia Singapore - The littoral combat ship USS Coronado (LCS 4) departed Singapore yesterday after completing a 14-month rotational deployment to Southeast Asia. During the deployment, the ship and crew operated with navies of 16 partner nations, participated in 11 multilateral and bilateral exercises, and made 10 strategic port visits across the region. "The rotational deployment of USS Coronado demonstrated the relevance of LCS as a platform tailor made for the dynamic and congested sea lanes, straits and archipelagos of South and Southeast Asia, providing flexible options and tactical advantages," said Rear Adm Don Gabrielson, Commander, Task Force 73. "We made tremendous strides in a challenging, forward deployed environment and the team is already applying lessons learned to future deployments in 2018. The Navy remains committed to the rotational deployment of LCS to the Indo-Asia-Pacific and views the LCS as a pillar of future U.S. maritime presence in Southeast Asia." Coronado achieved many operational milestones for the LCS program to include coordinated counterpiracy operations with the Philippine Navy in the Sulu Sea and inaugural port visits to Cam Ranh, Vietnam and Lamut, Malaysia where the ship and crew deepened maritime partnerships. While operating alongside the Republic of Singapore Navy during exercise Pacific Griffin near Guam, Coronado fired a Harpoon surface-to-surface missile and successfully struck a target beyond visual range. The ship also contributed to regional maritime security through routine presence operations in the South China Sea, Philippine Sea, Andaman Sea, and the Straits of Malacca and Singapore. "USS Coronado has been an integral part of building and strengthening maritime partnerships around the region," said Capt. Lex Walker, commodore of Destroyer Squadron (DESRON) 7. "By working side-by-side with partner nations and learning from each other, we were able to effectively operate Coronado and enable the ship to make valuable contributions to maritime stability and security in the region." There were also opportunities to improve scheduled and expeditionary maintenance for a deployed LCS. The ship's maintainers reduced the average repair time while deployed from 15 to 4 days, increasing the availability and readiness of Coronado to operate across the region. Coronado also conducted expeditionary maintenance availabilities in locations outside Singapore to include Cam Ranh, Vietnam, Guam, and Lumut, Malaysia. "I am extremely proud of the Sailors and the work we did in the region," said Cmdr. Douglas Meagher, commanding officer of Coronado. "The experiences we've made with new friends and partner navies throughout the region during this deployment will remain with us for a long time." As U.S. 7th Fleet's executive agent for theater security cooperation in South and Southeast Asia, Commander, Task Force 73 and DESRON 7 conduct advanced planning, organize resources and directly support the execution of maritime exercises and engagements, such as Pacific Partnership, the bilateral CARAT series, the Naval Engagement Activity (NEA) with Vietnam and the multi-lateral Southeast Asia Cooperation and Training (SEACAT). Task Force 73 and DESRON 7 also tactically control and coordinate maintenance for rotationally deployed Littoral Combat Ships. This Big Indian Joint Family Has 72 Members Living in The Same House in Maharashtra Brexit is the biggest worry for Irish companies for next year, a survey has revealed. While business figures across the Republic are mostly concerned about the impact of the UK's split from Europe, fewer than one in 10 European firms give it the same priority. The survey of tens of thousands of companies across 23 countries found Irish companies are feeling significantly more exposed to Brexit than those on the continent. Ian Talbot, Chambers Ireland chief executive, said the divorce from the European Union is a peripheral issue for business people outside Ireland and the UK. " While it is not surprising that Brexit is a priority for Irish business given our proximity to the UK and the importance of our trading relationship, it is alarming that businesses across Europe are not more concerned by the potential impact of the loss of the EU's second biggest market," he said. Mr Talbot, who is deputy president of Eurochambres which carries out the economic survey, said European business people are more concerned with security for their citizens, job creation and the economic security of the Eurozone. The Chambers' chief executive said Irish businesses have role to play in helping counterparts across Europe understand that there will be reduced economic growth, investment and jobs unless there is a practical approach to Brexit negotiations. The survey found the priority issues for businesses across Europe are d omestic demand followed by a lack of skilled workers and labour costs. Eurochambres said most countries ranked Brexit as the least important challenge for next year and it said the lack of concern may be explained as the split is not due to kick in until 2019. Some people opposed to abortion have declined to give evidence to the committee The refusal of certain anti-abortion advocates to appear before an Oireachtas committee examining the Eighth Amendment is "very regrettable", its chairwoman has said. Fine Gael senator Catherine Noone conceded that the committee was struggling to secure witnesses who were opposed to changing the constitutional position on terminations. Her remarks came after a second witness declined an invite, suggesting the committee had already adopted a pro-choice position. Last month, a majority of committee members voted that the Eighth Amendment - which recognises the unborn child's right to life - should not be retained in full. The decision not to attend by US expert Martin McCaffrey, a professor of paediatrics at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, came after anti-abortion campaign group Both Lives Matter also turned down an invite. The committee is examining evidence on the controversial issue ahead of next summer's referendum on the future of the Eighth Amendment. The existing amendment to the constitution affords equal rights to pregnant women and unborn children. Added to the constitution in 1983, the amendment recognises an unborn child's right to life. Terminations are currently only permitted when the life of the mother is at risk and the maximum penalty for accessing an illegal abortion in Ireland is 14 years in prison. Thousands of Irish women travel across the Irish Sea to Great Britain every year to have a legal abortion. At the start of Wednesday's committee hearing, Ms Noone said the potential witnesses who declined invites were of the view that their attendance was "not worthwhile" given the committee's vote. She stressed that the committee had not voted to repeal the Eighth Amendment, only that it should not be retained in full. "It is a pity that we have not heard legal and medical argument that would be different from what we have heard to date," she said. "The opportunity is still there to suggest particular witnesses to come before us but there is a struggle in getting certain sides of the argument to attend this committee and I think that that is regrettable - very, very regrettable." There were heated exchanges around the committee table after Ms Noone made her remarks. Independent senator Ronan Mullen claimed the committee had "impugned its own credibility" with the vote. "I think there is a clear question mark in the public mind as to why this committee didn't wait to hear from all witnesses before moving ahead with a very substantial recommendation about what the future of Ireland's abortion law should be," he said. Gardai are battling to curb a renewed blitz of rural burglaries conducted by Dublin-based crime gangs. More than 40 burglaries have been recorded in one area of Cork since mid-October with suspected burglaries by Dublin gangs also taking place in Tipperary, Waterford, Limerick, Offaly, Laois and Kilkenny. The Midlands has also witnessed a burglary blitz involving two aggravated raids where residents were threatened during break-ins. A notorious Limerick gang is believed to have been involved in the brutal aggravated burglary of a 54-year-old Offaly farmer last weekend. During the burglary, carried out by a four-member gang with distinctive Munster accents, the raiders beat the farmers dog until the terrified animal fled the farmhouse. The farmer was then himself beaten with an iron bar before being dragged out to the farmyard and locked in a shed. Expand Close The entrance to Richie McKelvie's farm (right of picture) at Coolderry, Co. Offaly today, PIC COLIN O'RIORDAN / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp The entrance to Richie McKelvie's farm (right of picture) at Coolderry, Co. Offaly today, PIC COLIN O'RIORDAN The revelation came as Birr gardai appealed to anyone who travelled on the main N62 Birr to Roscrea road between late Friday evening and early on Saturday morning to contact them if they spotted anything unusual or suspicious. The farmer managed to free himself from the shed and raise the alarm in the early hours of Saturday morning. He was treated for non-life threatening injuries. The man is said by locals to be very shocked by the incident. Gardai suspect the gang fled the area in a powerful 4x4 car. The robbery took place on a farm at Glasderrybeg, Brosna, near Birr, and just off the N62 road. Expand Close The entrance to Richie McKelvey's farm at Coolderry, Co. Offaly today, PIC COLIN O'RIORDAN / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp The entrance to Richie McKelvey's farm at Coolderry, Co. Offaly today, PIC COLIN O'RIORDAN Superintendent Martin Cashen said it was a very serious incident. We would appeal to anyone who witnessed anything suspicious or even something just out of the ordinary in the area to contact us, he said. In particular, we would like to hear about any suspicious persons or vehicles in the Drumakeenan and Glassderrybeg areas on the N62 Birr to Roscrea road that was noticed in the days leading up to the incident. Gardai are checking CCTV security camera footage from towns and villages in the area to try to trace the movements of any vehicles matching the description of the 4x4 used. While inquiries are only at a preliminary stage, gardai do not believe that Dublin gangs who have been terrorising parts of the Midlands and Munster over recent weeks are responsible for the Brosna attack. One Garda source said the farm raid is believed to have been conducted by a Limerick-based gang who have repeatedly targeted farms across Munster and south Leinster for cash and valuable farm machinery such as generators, quads and chainsaws, which are then sold on. The Irish Farmers Association (IFA) warned it was now clear that gardai in rural areas needed greater resources, including additional manpower and increased patrols, to combat the burglary trend. IFA security chairman Jer Bergin said upset at recent raids will be dealt with at association branch meetings nationwide before Christmas. Mr Bergin said the IFA works extremely closely with gardai to promote rural security and would now be demanding better resources for the force. We are now calling for rural Ireland to get its fair allocation of gardai and Garda patrol cars, he said. Warned In just one Cork area, there were six burglaries recorded between 4pm and 9pm last Friday. The special Garda crackdown on rural crime, Operation Thor, has proved a great success but campaigners have warned it now requires increased resources and tactical flexibility. Irish Rural Link has repeatedly called for Operation Thor to be expanded and better resourced. Gardai admitted that gangs have modified their operating tactics in direct response to Operation Thor. The crackdown, launched in November 2015 in response to a shocking 40pc hike in burglary rates in some parts of Ireland, was a tremendous success. Central Statistics Office (CSO) crime figures showed a 31pc decline in the number of rural burglaries. However, anecdotal evidence is that there has been a surge in burglaries since June. Burglaries had dropped from 28,419 in the final quarter of 2015 to 19,562 for the final quarter of 2016. Farm fatalities will rise this winter unless farmers heed safety campaigns, a leading safety expert has warned. "I hope we won't reach 2014 levels (30 deaths) but with still two months to go we already have 22 deaths - there's people in intensive care after accidents as well," said HSA chief inspector Pat Griffin. While farm accidents have traditionally peaked in the summer, Teagasc's heath and safety advisor John McNamara said that farmers need to take extra care during the winter as they are vulnerable to accidents at any time. "There was a time when accidents used to rise in June and fall in winter but that has gone. Accidents can peak at any time of year. "Last year there was a high trend in December and certainly as the work increases in January people get busier and rush more," he said. Mr McNamara warned that the farming sector needs to aim for a "zero vision" in order to reduce farm deaths. Expand Close Pat Griffin Director of the HSA / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Pat Griffin Director of the HSA Mentality Mr McNamara pointed to rising fatality figures in some European countries that had previously reached zero fatalities on farms. "Sweden in 2006 reached zero which was great but in 2014 it had eight deaths. In 2014 Denmark had zero deaths but in 2016 they had 16 deaths." Mr Griffin said that agriculture is the most dangerous industry in Ireland and that the mentality of farmers needs to change. "If you look at everyone in Ireland, we have between 18 and 19 deaths per 100,000 in agriculture, so that means it has by far the highest rate of accidents of any major economic sector in Ireland. We have to change that. "Farmers have to know and understand where the risks are and protect themselves from them. "If you look at 10 years of deaths the big figure I want to point out is that 197 people have been killed, that's 197 families destroyed. It's absolutely horrendous," he said. There is a grave danger that Irish farmers could become the fall guy - and girls - as the world finally wakes up to the challenges of global warming. ICMSA president John Comer struck a chord with this writer yesterday when he called on the "real citizens' assembly" - otherwise known as Dail Eireann - to reject the climate proposals which emerged from the so-called "Citizens' Assembly" on Sunday evening. Mr Comer is right. The Citizens' Assembly was a political cop out set up because many of our politicians did not want to do their law-making job and face up to the tricky and divisive issue of abortion. One wonders why we have elections at all. We could just hire a polling company to gather a group of citizens to run the country altogether. Dail Eireann is the real citizens' assembly, democratically elected, and cannot be supplanted by some PR creation. But the assembly did vote on 13 provisions aimed at making Ireland a world leader in the battle against global warming. These will be in the Dail early next year and the fat will really be in the fire then. The long and short of it is that farmers could face fines for greenhouse emissions. These could be set against a set of incentives, as favoured by Green Party leader Eamon Ryan, which would reward those who manage their land better and engage in farming which sequesters carbon. We understandably like the second bit but we find the first bit rather alarming. Farm unions have for years been fighting to get Ireland's grass-based beef and dairy production recognised as less harmful to the environment. And the fight goes on. The ICMSA's searing reaction to the proposals was not confined to pointing out where the real citizens' assembly is. John Comer said that the key issue in the climate debate is too often ignored. This is the continued growth of the global human population with an increased demand for food which must be produced somewhere. Once that truth is accepted, the debate must switch to being about where food can be produced in the least environmentally stressful circumstances. "Ireland is one of the most climate-efficient food producers in the world and should be a place where food production should be encouraged - not penalised as per the Citizens' Assembly," John Comer argued. Mr Comer happily acknowledged the importance of global warming and the urgency with which it should be tackled. But he argues that it needs to be examined globally rather than at a country level. He said that imposing a tax on Irish agriculture to address climate change would actually be counter-productive with food production moving to less carbon-efficient countries. After many false starts there are now signs that the issue of climate change is beginning to hit home to ordinary citizens across the country. True, we are heavily dependent on what way the mega economies such as USA and China are responding to the challenges. The stance of Donald Trump on the issue is probably the greatest travesty of his administration. But the old defeatism that this is an alibi for small countries like Ireland doing nothing is happily fading. This is something we all have an obligation to deal with for the good of the next generation. John Downing is an Irish Independent political correspondent Revolut intends to build its own payment processor in-house and expects the banking licence to be in place by 2018. Stock image A financial technology startup that has grown rapidly thanks to its offering of app-based banking products has applied for a European Banking Licence. Revolut, which boasts 50,000 Irish users, intends to build its own payment processor in-house and expects the banking licence to be in place by 2018. The licence will allow the traditional bank alternative to offer deposit and credit services across Europe, including overdrafts, personal loans and term deposits. The decision to bring processes in-house follows a series of complaints by users on social media recently, who said their cards had been declined or their payments had been rejected. The London-based fintech, whose founder and CEO Nikolay Storonsky spoke at the Web Summit yesterday, blamed the issue on "a third-party processor". "We delayed applying for a banking licence because we wanted to focus all of our resources on product innovation from day one," said Storonsky. "Even without a banking licence, we have attracted over 950,000 users across Europe, many of whom consider Revolut as their primary current account and spending card." Founded in 2015 by Mr Storonsky and Vlad Yatsenko, Revolut offers a pre-paid card linked to an app that lets people buy, hold, and transfer money in multiple currencies at low rates. In the last few weeks, the company launched its initial insurance offering, mobile phone cover, which began the fintech's initial expansion into insurance as part of its ambition to become "the first global banking app". The banking licence will also offer Revolut's 950,000 global users extra reassurance as it would protect customers' funds up to 100,000 under the European Deposit Protection Scheme. Potential disruptors to traditional banks are seeking to elbow their way into a rapidly changing market, which also faces disruption caused by Brexit. Yesterday, ECB head of supervision Daniele Nouy said licence applications from about 20 banks are in some stage of assessment by supervisors on the continent. "Maybe they have not signed the formal requirement," she said, but they have made a "pretty comprehensive application that can be turned into a formal one very, very fast". About 50 banks have discussed their Brexit business-relocation plans with authorities in the European Union, she said. International banks are working on plans to shift workers from the UK to the Continent after Brexit to maintain access to the single market. UBS Group CEO Sergio Ermotti has said it will start the process of moving London-based employees to expanded offices inside the EU early next year. Frankfurt, has emerged as a destination of choice for the biggest banks. JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup and Deutsche Bank are all scouting the market there for offices. Goldman Sachs has already signed leases for offices that it won't move into until 2019. (Additional reporting Bloomberg) The largest shareholder of HNA Group - the Chinese conglomerate that's been buying stakes in companies including Irish aircraft-lessor Avolon and Germany's Deutsche Bank - is set to appoint former German vice chancellor Philipp Roesler as its chief, according to people familiar with the matter. Mr Roesler, who served as chair of Germany's Free Democratic Party (FDP) from 2011 to 2013, and as vice chancellor in a coalition government led by Angela Merkel, will remain head of government relations at the World Economic Forum. Vietnam-born Philipp Roesler was adopted by German parents and raised in Germany. He is poised to take the helm at New York-based Hainan Cihang Charity Foundation within the coming weeks, said the people, who asked not to be identified speaking ahead of the announcement. Roesler's appointment was engineered by Christian Angermayer, a German entrepreneur and adviser to HNA, according to the sources. An HNA representative declined to comment. With a stake of 29.5pc, New York-based Cihang is the largest shareholder of sprawling conglomerate HNA, which has about $180bn in assets. The move comes less than four months after HNA revealed its ownership structure amid heightened regulatory scrutiny in the US and China. Roesler's appointment is also a sign of HNA's commitment to being a long-term investor in Europe and specifically Germany, where it is Deutsche Bank's largest shareholder with a stake of just under 10pc, the people said. HNA came into focus in Germany in July, when the European Central Bank considered a review of the conglomerate for its role as the largest investor in Deutsche Bank, people familiar with the matter said at the time. Such reviews typically focus on an owner's financing structure and mid-term strategy. Felix Hufeld, who heads Germany's financial regulator, told Bloomberg in September that HNA can expect more scrutiny if it boosts its Deutsche Bank holding. Roesler, 44, would provide HNA with political connections. Born in Vietnam and adopted by a German couple as a baby, Roesler was the country's economy minister and vice chancellor for the pro-business FPD party from 2011 to 2013 and has been a vocal supporter of Chinese investments in Germany. (Bloomberg) Ryanair bases that are home to more than 3,000 of its pilots have now demanded that the airline engage with the newly-formed European Employee Relations Committee (EERC) on their behalf. The EERC was established by Ryanair pilots in the wake of the pilot-rostering debacle at the airline. However, it has been dismissed by the carrier as a group that was established by competitor airline unions. In recent weeks - as a growing numbers of Ryanair bases requested the airline engage with the EERC - the airline has continued to insist that it will only deal with individual employee relations committees (ERCs) that it has established at each of its almost 90 bases and through which it typically negotiates pay and other deals with pilots. Yesterday, Ryanair pilot captain Terry O'Connor - who is resigning from the airline after 12 years and is working out his notice period - wrote to Ryanair chief executive Michael O'Leary. He told the airline boss that the EERC was only made up of Ryanair pilots and contained no pilots from any rival airlines. Read More Mr O'Connor said he had been asked by the EERC to act as an intermediary with airline management. "In the near future, the interim EERC will send you details of the conditions and pay proposal that Ryanair pilots from across the bases network have contributed to developing," Mr O'Connor said in his letter to Mr O'Leary. "It will present a fair and balanced framework which will enable both pilots and management to enjoy a long and mutually-beneficial relationship. "We believe it will attract new colleagues, stem attrition rates, grow the company and renew passenger confidence in our brand." Ryanair said it doesn't comment on "rumour and speculation". Almost 60 Ryanair ERCs have also written to Mr O'Leary to seek collective-bargaining arrangements. The 59 bases that have signed the letter represent a majority of Ryanair's 4,200 pilots. Ryanair pilots at a number of bases, including London Stansted and Madrid, have already rejected revised pay proposals from the airline. Hundreds of AIB staff should have tracker mortgages returned to them, a leading expert in the area said. It follows claims by unions at Bank of Ireland that the lender has conceded it now has to restore 2,000 staff to tracker rates and refund them. AIB is denying many of its staff the low-cost rate, financial adviser Padraic Kissane said. Mr Kissane, who specialises in tracker restoration cases, said large numbers of AIB staff members on trackers had opted for a fixed-rate mortgage when European Central Bank rates shot up. When the fixed-rate period ended they should have been given the option to return to a tracker rate. This is usually set 1pc to 1.2 percentage points more than the ECB rate. But they were denied the tracker rate. Other staff members were put back on what the bank claims is a tracker, but is set at 3.67pc more than the ECB rate. Mr Kissane said this could not be reasonably regarded as a tracker rate. Some staff have been put on "staff mortgage rate" which is lower than variable rates, but not as low as a tracker rate, he said. "There are hundreds of AIB staff who have been denied tracker rates. Maybe not as many as in the case of Bank of Ireland, but I have a large number of AIB cases," he said. AIB said staff mortgages were part of the review it is carrying out in conjunction with the Central Bank on the loss of trackers. "Staff customers form part of the ongoing review and if deemed impacted are redressed and compensated in line with the requirements of the framework," the bank said. A free-for-use event space in the middle of Dublin's Silicon Docks is being made available for start-ups, coworkers and local groups. DoSpace coworking and Dublin City Council have teamed up for this new pilot programme which aims to encourage networking, knowledge sharing and connectivity of the city's enterprise community. The innovative project aims to succeed in its mission by running a series of events, the first of which will take place between November 2017 and January 2018. Lord Mayor of Dublin, Micheal MacDonncha said "partnerships and events such as these are vital to aiding the vibrant entrepreneurship and business community in Dublin City. These events provide great opportunities for new and existing small businesses to grow their ideas, network and business further". Graham Barkers DoSpace facility, which was first created in 2015 on a barge moored along the Grand Canal Basin, has already welcomed many events, hosting startups from around the world. Read More DoSpace, which is an industry partner to Trinity College Dublin, boasts members - freelancers, entrepreneurs, startups, sole traders, service providers expanding firms - from the software, medtech and renewables sectors. "We have hosted startup weekends, hackathons for many businesses such as Drupal as well as meetups and college innovation events for Stanford University and HEC," DoSpace community manager, Gwladys Pennac said. "With the kind and supportive backing of Dublin City Council, we look forward to offering our space to even more of the ecosystem, especially at a local level." Event slots for the space are limited and can be applied for via this application form or by contacting DoSpace. Chipmaker Broadcom has made an unsolicited $103bn bid for Qualcomm, setting the stage for a takeover battle that could reshape the industry at the heart of mobile phone hardware. Qualcomm said it would review the proposal but the San Diego-based company is inclined to reject the bid as too low and fraught with risk that regulators may reject it or take too long to approve it, people familiar with the matter told Reuters. Broadcom CEO Hock Tan, who turned a small chipmaker into a $100bn company based in Singapore and the United States, told Reuters he would not rule out a proxy fight to convince shareholders to replace the board and accept the offer. "We are well advised and know what our options are, and we have not eliminated any of those options," said Mr Tan, who has pulled off a string of deals over the past decade. "We have a very strong desire to work with Qualcomm to reach a mutually beneficial deal." A combined Broadcom-Qualcomm would become the dominant supplier of chips used in the 1.5 billion or so smartphones expected to be sold around the world this year. It would raise the stakes for Intel Corp, which has been diversifying from its stronghold in computers into smartphone technology by supplying modem chips to Apple. Qualcomm shareholders, who have watched their investment sour over the past year in the face of a patent dispute with Apple, would get $60 in cash and $10 per share in Broadcom stock in a deal, according to Broadcom's proposal. Including debt, the transaction is worth $130bn. "Now it's a game of high-stakes poker for both sides," said GBH Insight analyst Daniel Ives, who believes bullish investors were hoping for $75 to $80 a share. The offer represents a premium of 27.6pc to Qualcomm's closing price of $54.84 on Thursday. Shares of Qualcomm, whose chips allow phones to connect to wireless data networks, traded above $70 as recently as December 2016 and topped $80 in 2014. They rose 1.1pc to $62.52, suggesting scepticism a deal would happen. Any deal struck between the two companies would face intense regulatory scrutiny, especially in China, which is home to expanding rivals. Chinese ambitions to buy US chipmakers have been thwarted by US regulators. Qualcomm sells modem chips that allow phones to send data as well as communications chips for automobiles that handle "infotainment" systems and wireless electric vehicle charging. Qualcomm provides chips to carrier networks to deliver broadband and mobile data and is also in the process of closing a $38bn bid for automotive chipmaker NXP Semiconductors NV that it made last year. Broadcom, Qualcomm and NXP together would have control over modems, Wi-Fi, GPS and near-field communications chips, a strong position that could concern customers such as Apple and Samsung because of the bargaining power such a combined company could have to raise prices. However, a combined company would also likely have a lower cost base and the flexibility to cut prices. Herbert Hovenkamp, who teaches antitrust at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, said that US regulators would try to ensure the deal would not lead to higher chip prices. "Based on what I've seen, it seems unlikely to me that there's a basis for a challenge (to stop the deal)," he said. (Reuters) 1. Yes. The ordinance goes against state law and is not in the best interest of the cities. 2. Yes. At the very least, it should be amended to give police officers some discretion. 3. No. Voters approved the ordinance by large majorities; the councils cant ignore that fact. 4. No. The petition process has to be given a chance to work. Leave the ordinance alone. 5. Unsure. Its hard to say how the cities should move forward regarding the ordinance. Vote View Results A strategic report on developing a new brand for Irelands financial services targeted at Asian markets has been announced. The report, which has been developed as a partnership project involving Irish think tank on Asia, Asia Matters and PwC, will assist the work of the Department of Finance, IFS Ireland Irelands international financial services brand and coincide with the IFS 2020 strategy. The IFS 2020 strategy is a Government initiative for driving the growth and development of international financial services in Ireland. Making the announcement at the Global Asia Matters Business Summit in Dublin today, Asia Matters executive director Martin Murray said it planned to engage its members in order to establish how best to refocus Irelands financial services successful offering in the United States to target the growing Asian market. "IFS Ireland has been very successful in attracting business from the US. There are great opportunities for the financial services sector in Ireland to grow business in Asia but we need to amend and tailor our offering in a way that resonates with Asian firms," Mr Murray said. As part of this strategy, Mr Murray said that Asia Matters would be engaging with key stakeholders in the financial powerhouses of Japan, China, Hong Kong and Singapore to produce a new Asian initiative for branding and developing Irelands financial services offering. Expand Close Joe Tynan, PwC Ireland Head of Tax / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Joe Tynan, PwC Ireland Head of Tax Currently IFS Ireland is home to 400 plus companies, employing 38,000 people. "Ireland is the fourth largest exporter in the EU of financial services and we are world leaders in aviation leasing and finance and growing significantly across other sectors, including managed funds and insurance," Mr Murray said. Speaking at the Asia Matters summit, Joe Tynan, PwC Ireland Head of Tax, said the latest survey from Asia indicated that business leaders are intent on pressing ahead with investment plans regardless of current uncertainty. Citing the just published survey by PwC of 1,400 business leaders in Asia, Mr Tynan said that 71pc of CEOs expect to rely more on business partnerships/joint ventures in the future. "This is good news for Ireland as APEC business leaders are looking increasingly for opportunities outside of their region," Mr Tynan said. Mr Tynan went on to say that there were "huge opportunities" for Ireland to become a global trading hub positioning itself as a gateway from Asia to the EU and the US. "With geopolitical challenges such as protectionism, global tax reform and Brexit, companies will always need a presence in the markets they serve. Ireland offers a great place for Asian companies to do business with the EU and the US," he said. The importance of the Asian market to Ireland was backed up by Venkatesh Priyadarshi, head of Tata Ireland and Business Development TCS, who said that there were great positives to trade between Asia and Europe. Mr Priyadarshi said there were a number of factors behind why Asian companies were expanding in Ireland including the country's membership of the Single Market, its strategic location to access the US market, and the availability of talent in the country. Currently approximately 11pc of total exports from Ireland are going to the Asian market. Among the guest speakers at the Asian Matters 2017 event today were Tanaiste and Minister for Business, Enterprise and Innovation, Frances Fitzgerald TD, the Minister of State for Financial Services and Insurance, Michael D Arcy TD, David Martin, Director China Britain Business Council, Noriyuki Sato, Executive Vice President Mitsui & Co Europe, and Dearbhail McDonald, Group Business Editor Independent News & Media. A swearing bear is probably not what Marks and Spencer were hoping viewers would remark upon with their new Christmas ad. Paddington & The Christmas Visitor stars the bear of the moment, voiced by Ben Whishaw, and a burglar dressed in red, who Paddington mistakes for Santa Claus. The ad, which dropped on Tuesday ahead of the release of Paddington 2 on Friday, sees the Peruvian bear happen across the burglar on the Brown family's roof just as he is just about to make off with a bag of stolen presents. Despite his protestations, Paddington helps him to return the Christmas presents to their rightful owners. Once they have completed their task Paddington offers the burglar his marmalade sandwich and that gesture of goodwill, combined with the happy faces of the children on Christmas morning, touches the burglar's heart. He hugs Paddington and says, 'Thank you little bear'. Unfortunately, some viewers were surprised as they misheard it as 'f*** you little bear', which is clearly not the case although it would be understandable given Paddington has returned his loot. 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 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 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 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 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 Video of the Day An M&S spokesman in the UK confirmed in a statement, "He's saying, 'Thank you, little bear'. I think it's really clear. We wouldn't change the ad." Nor should they. Response has been overwhelmingly positive. 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 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 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 U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania arrive on Air Force One at Beijing, China, November 8, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump exit Air Force One upon their arrival at Beijing Capital Airport, Beijing, China November 8, 2017. REUTERS/Lintao Zhang/Pool U.S. President Donald Trump and U.S. first lady Melania visit the Forbidden City with ChinaOs President Xi Jinping and ChinaOs First Lady Peng Liyuan in Beijing, China, November 8, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst U.S. President Donald Trump and U.S. first lady Melania visit the Forbidden City with ChinaOs President Xi Jinping in Beijing, China, November 8, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst President Donald Trump is making his first official visit to China amid regional tensions on trade and North Korea. Mr Trump landed in Beijing on Wednesday following events in South Korea and is scheduled to meet multiple times with China's President, Xi Jinping, during the two-day visit. Mr Xi was due to treat Mr Trump to a lavish welcoming ceremony and tour of the Forbidden City, home to China's ancient imperial palaces. The visit comes hours after Mr Trump addressed South Korea's National Assembly and pressured China to stop supporting North Korea. Expand Close U.S. President Donald Trump and U.S. first lady Melania visit the Forbidden City with ChinaOs President Xi Jinping and ChinaOs First Lady Peng Liyuan in Beijing, China, November 8, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp U.S. President Donald Trump and U.S. first lady Melania visit the Forbidden City with ChinaOs President Xi Jinping and ChinaOs First Lady Peng Liyuan in Beijing, China, November 8, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst Mr Trump made equalising trade with China a centerpiece of his presidential campaign, but he has signalled that he may ease up in exchange for China's help with North Korea. However Mr Trump arrived in Beijing on Wednesday amid mounting US trade complaints, with limited prospects for progress on market access, technology policy and other sore points. Expand Close President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump exit Air Force One upon their arrival at Beijing Capital Airport, Beijing, China November 8, 2017. REUTERS/Lintao Zhang/Pool / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump exit Air Force One upon their arrival at Beijing Capital Airport, Beijing, China November 8, 2017. REUTERS/Lintao Zhang/Pool The strains between the world's two biggest economies are fuelling anxiety among global companies and advocates of free trade that they could retreat into protectionism, dragging down growth. Washington accuses Beijing of backsliding on market-opening promises, and Mr Trump said last week that the US trade deficit with China - 347 billion dollars last year - is "so bad that it's embarrassing." Expand Close U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania arrive on Air Force One at Beijing, China, November 8, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania arrive on Air Force One at Beijing, China, November 8, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst "I don't want to embarrass anybody four days before I land in China, but it's horrible," said Mr Trump. His government has raised import duties on Chinese aluminium foil, stainless steel and plywood, and is investigating whether Beijing improperly pressures foreign companies to hand over technology. If they discuss trade during the two-day visit, Mr Xi's government is unlikely to offer enough "to appease US negotiators," said John Davies of BMI Research. That is likely to lead to "more protectionist measures on the part of the US," said Mr Davies. While Mr Trump is looking to boost sagging public approval ratings, the Chinese leader enters their meeting on a political high. The ruling Communist Party added Mr Xi's name to its constitution at a twice-a-decade congress last month, giving him status equal to Mao Zedong, founder of the communist government, and Deng Xiaoping, who launched economic reforms in 1979. At the congress, Xi promised to open the economy wider but affirmed plans to build up state-owned companies that dominate industries including finance, energy and telecoms. That, along with plans for government-led development of electric cars and other technology, makes foreign companies worry that Beijing is squeezing them out of promising field A former British Army soldier was today found guilty of murder for stabbing a man to death outside a chip shop in Dublin. Donal Colgan (66) had pleaded not guilty to murder but guilty to the manslaughter of 44-year-old David Sheridan who died after Mr Colgan stabbed him outside Luigi's takeaway on Dublin's North Strand Road on August 17, 2014. The defence argued that Mr Colgan lost all self control when David Sheridan struck him on the head with a bag of cans. The prosecution said that Mr Colgan attacked the deceased out of anger following an altercation seven minutes earlier outside the chip shop. The jury reached their unanimous decision following five days of evidence and six hours and 44 minutes of deliberation. Justice Tony Hunt thanked the eight women and three men, saying they had discharged a "very difficult task". He excused them from further service for ten years. In a statement read to the court by Garda Ronan Hobbs, Mr Sheridan's son Jake Fay said his dad was "not perfect but did his best" and he didn't deserve to die in the way he did. He said his memories of his dad are of going to matches, cooking and watching television together and added that he will never forgive Donal Colgan. Garda Hobbs told prosecuting counsel Paul Burns SC that Colgan had two previous convictions, one for assault and one under the Non-Fatal Offences Against the State Act. Justice Hunt said he had the "sad and grim duty" of sentencing Colgan to life. He said it is sometimes satisfying to send a person to prison but this was not one of those occasions. While saying he could find no fault with the jury's decision, he said he is sure that Colgan did not go out that evening with any intention of doing what he did and that if he could turn back the clock he would. He also offered his condolences to Mr Sheridan's family and said it was clear the deceased was a "nice man" who did not deserve to die in such a "cruel" way. Justice Hunt also called on the legislature to look at the defence of provocation that was used by Colgan, particularly in cases where an accused person brings an offensive weapon "in to play". After speaking with and hugging members of his family, Colgan was led away to begin his life sentence. This was the second time Colgan went on trial for Mr Sheridan's murder. His first trial collapsed when the jury discovered a gap in the CCTV footage from when Colgan left the chip shop to when the fatal stabbing happened. Evidence in trial The trial heard that Colgan, who joined the British Army aged 16 and was discharged after suffering injuries due to an explosion in the Libyan desert, had spent that Sunday evening drinking in the Sunset House. He went to Luigi's for a bag of chips on his way home and while he was in the chip shop a number of young "lads" started "slagging him off". When Mr Sheridan arrived with his friend Gary Kinlan CCTV footage showed Colgan pointing his fingers at them in what the prosecution said was an aggressive gesture. As Colgan left the chip shop he became involved in a scuffle with Gary Kinlan. Giving evidence on Day 4 of the trial Colgan said Mr Kinlan punched him and then Mr Sheridan emerged from the chip shop and said: "Hit him with the bottles." Mr Kinlan, he said, threw a bottle at him, striking him on the forehead and knocking him to the ground. Giving his evidence Mr Kinlan said that Colgan was was the first to throw a punch and described him as "cheeky" and "loud", shouting at everyone in the chip shop. After being struck by the bottle Colgan said he was "dazed" and anger and frustration took over. He walked to his nearby apartment, retrieved a kitchen knife and returned to Luigi's seven minutes after the initial scuffle with Mr Kinlan. Colgan said he went back because he was angry at what had happened to him. He said he had no idea what he intended to do and added: "I think it was to say, 'don't come near me again'." He said he had no intention of stabbing anyone and although he was afraid, anger and frustration took over. By the time he reached Luigi's, he said he started hoping that Mr Sheridan and Mr Kinlan would not be there. But they were there. First he saw Mr Kinlan who ran away. Then he said he was attacked by the deceased, who he said hit him on the head with a bag of cans. He added: "I thought straight away here we go again. And I just lost complete control of myself." It was from this that the defence of provocation was entered, with Justice Tony Hunt explaining to the jury that if a person accused of murder was provoked by the deceased to the point where he is no longer master of his own mind then he is guilty of manslaughter and not murder. Justice Hunt explained that the loss of control must be sudden and that the situation cannot be created by the accused person. The jury had asked Justice Hunt to explain the definition of provocation one more time this afternoon. About 10 minutes later they came back with their verdict: guilty of murder. JOHN Halligan is the Minister of State who asked a high ranking civil servant if she was married or had children during a job interview. Mr Halligans comments resulted in a Government department being ordered to pay the woman 7,500 in compensation following a Workplace Relations Committee (WRC) ruling. Mr Halligan, who is currently in Thailand on State business, confirmed to Independent.ie that he is the minister at the centre of the WRC ruling. The minister said he was upset by the ruling as he feels he runs a family friendly office. I was simply trying to put the interviewee at ease. I wanted to assure her that I am as flexible as possible with members of my team with any external or non-work commitments they may have, he told Independent.ie All of my staff start at 10am because they need to get their kids to school and can finish early if they need to. Im upset in the sense I genuinely didnt think I was doing anything wrong. Sometimes I am wrong but I operate a family friendly environment, he added The WRC ruling found the executive officer, who has been employed by the civil service since 1993, applied for one of two posts of private secretary in May 2016 to two Junior Government Ministers in the same Government department. At the interview, Mr Halligan said to the official: I shouldnt be asking you this, but... Are you a married woman? Do you have children? How old are your children? The female official answered the questions and confirmed that she was married and that she was the mother of two children and she indicated their ages. In reply, the minister observed you must be very busy. At a Workplace Relations Commission (WRC) hearing into the officials claim of discrimination under the Employment Equality Acts, the ministers words at the interview were neither challenged or denied. In her ruling which found that the woman was discriminated against, WRC Adjudication Officer, Penelope McGrath found the Junior Ministers comments to be so outmoded. She said: "It was ill-advised of the Minister of State to have so pointedly obtained information that had nothing to do with this candidates suitability for a position, and a position for which she had determined she was eligible to compete." Ms McGrath found that the woman was put in a difficult situation in a job interview by reason of probing questions which went to the heart of her married and family life which historically could not be considered gender neutral questions. Ms McGrath said that the questions also indirectly associated her with the task of primary homemaker and therefore not as available as other less encumbered candidates might be. Speaking after the ruling, Mr Halligan confirmed he asked the woman if she had children. I did this as I wanted her to feel that I would be flexible in terms of any family business that she may have to attend to. Too many workplaces have less than family-friendly arrangements and I always ensure that my workplace is as family-friendly as possible, he said. This was the first time I was conducting an interview of this sort and I did not realise that it was unacceptable to ask such a question. But the question was coming from a good place. It was in no way meant to be discriminatory in any shape. During the course of the Workplace Relations Commission hearing, four members of my constituency team submitted testimonials backing up my ethos as an employer. As a true advocate for equality for all, I regret that this incident occurred. The reasons behind my actions that day was to try and be as accommodating as possible to people who have children. A UK lotto millionaire accused of defilement of an under-age Irish teenage girl has been further charged with 44 additional offences including rape, sexual assault and child pornography charges. The British man, who is in his late twenties, was arrested in Dublin in July after he travelled to Ireland to speak to the teens mother about his relationship with her daughter whom he allegedly met through an internet chat room. The wealthy businessman, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was originally charged with four counts of defilement by engaging in a sexual act with a child under the age of 17 years on dates in 2016 and this year. It carries a five-year sentence. He had been remanded in custody in July and remained there because he had been unable to take up bail set in his own bond of 100,000. Two independent sureties, each in the sums of 50,000, needed to be approved by the courts and he had to agree to live in Ireland and remain in contact with gardai. However, today he appeared before Judge Bernadette Owens at Cloverhill District Court to face 44 additional charges in connection with the investigation and bail was refused. She was told that 35 of the new charges are for defilement of the girl, there were four counts of rape, three counts of sexual assault, one allegation of assault causing harm to the girl and one charge of possessing child pornography. Garda Stephen Faulkner said the Director of Public Prosecutions has directed that he is to face trial in the Central Criminal Court. He objected to bail on the grounds the accused was a man of considerable wealth, a flight risk and some of the new charges carried life sentences. Judge Owens remanded him in custody to appear again next week. During the hearing today, Garda Faulkner alleged the man frequently travelled over from the UK by ferry to meet the girl and gardai have recovered videos of sexual activity between them from the defendants phone. However, it was alleged she told gardai she felt she was not in control of the situation. He said a complaint was made by the teens mother in January that her daughter, who is in her mid-teens, and the man were in a sexual relationship. The girl outlined that she met him through a named online chat-room, the bail hearing was told. Garda Faulkner said the girl was subscribed to the under-17s category of the website. They exchanged details and communicated through Snapchat and WhatsApp, he alleged. Garda Faulkner said it was alleged the man first came to Ireland to meet her last year. It was alleged they stayed in a hotel in Dublin and had sexual intercourse. She was aged 15 at the time and had told the accused, the court has heard. Garda Faulkner alleged that the man came back by ferry every four to six weeks. The girls mother alerted gardai and an investigation began. The court was also told that gardai allegedly recovered images and videos of sexual activity taking place and some recording during the course of sexual activity. An image of her ID card with her age was found on his phone as well as photo of her in her school uniform, the court heard. Last year he bought her a designer ring worth 2,500 telling the shop assistant it was an engagement ring, the judge heard. His bank accounts showed he won a substantial amount in the UK lotto, the garda has said. The court heard they stayed in hotels in Dublin. He travelled over in July to confront her mother about his feelings for the girl, the garda said. He said the girl has described the accused forcing himself on her and other incidents where she passed out. It was alleged she claimed the man had become violent and exercised control over her. She felt she was not in control of the situation, the garda said. He agreed with defence solicitor Michelle Finan the man, who has not yet entered a plea, had no previous criminal convictions, that he had travelled to Ireland knowing an investigation was on-going and extradition proceedings had not been required. However, Garda Faulkner said that when the man was arrested during his last visit he made his ferry booking hours before departure and was due to return later that day. Garda Faulkner believed he had done that to avoid apprehension. He also feared the man would leave Ireland and evade trial if granted bail. The accused would be able to run his business from any country once he had an internet connection, he said. Ms Finan said the man, who did not address the court, could face a two-year wait until his trial was reached and she asked the judge to note that the High Court had not refused to grant bail in relation to the first set of charges brought in the case. However, refusing bail Judge Owens said the High Court was not aware that additional further charges were going to brought and they carried significantly higher sentences. The first hearing into a teachers fitness to practice in an Irish school is underway at the Teaching Council's office in Maynooth. (Picture: Damien Eagers) The first hearing in Ireland into a teachers fitness to practice involves accusations that a female primary teacher applied sellotape, or caused it to be applied to the mouths of five fifth class girl pupils because they were chatting and messing The allegations, which involved a teacher working as a sub, are said to have occurred on March 7 2012, two days after she started what was supposed to be 12-week contract working at the school, covering a staff member with a broken leg. The teacher, who was not present, or represented, at the hearing, was in a learning support role in the school teaching a maths class, of both boys and girls, when the alleged incident occurred. Remy Farrell ,SC, outlining the case for the Teaching Council, said the evidence was that some students became giddy and she told them to be quiet, and, if not, she would put sellotape on their mouth. Shortly afterwards she approached the girls and either applied the sellotape or directed the girls to apply it themselves said Mr Farrell. The girls sat with sellotape on their mouths for about 30 minutes. When the class was over the pupils went to another class being conducted by the principal, where one boy overheard what happened and told the principal. The principal immediately brought the girls outside the room and asked them what had happened. They were upset and distressed, said Mr Farrell. By this stage, the teacher had gone to another school where she was also working and the principal left a message that the teachers services had been dispensed with. The teacher returned to the school later that afternoon and the principal confronted her. Mr Farrell said she sought to justify it and said they were chatting and messing and she didnt mean anything by it. Subsequently she denied to the inquiry team that she had done it and said that she had noticed at one point that the children had sellotape over their mouths. Earlier, the hearing heard that, in correspondence with the inquiry team, the teacher described the allegations as untrue and also called them historic and unfounded. She also claimed there was a bias against her and she believed she could not get fair procedure and said the council did not have permission to proceed with the oral hearing. The hearing heard of how attempts by solicitor Natasha Forde, acting on behalf of the Teaching Council director, to maintain contact with the teacher since a preliminary hearing was held in September were frustrated. The inquiry legal team had sent her documents concerning the allegations but later were unable to provide her with further documents. At one stage, the teacher indicated to the inquiry team that she no longer wished to be contacted by phone or email. Among the detailed evidence provided to the panel was that, last month, a man who answered a call to the contact number provided by the teacher, said that it was a wrong number. On other occasions there was no response or the call was disconnected. There were several attempts to communicate with the teacher by registered letter, and in the most recent, over two days last week, a summons server called to her apartment and there was no reply. One neighbour said she hadnt seen her for the previous week and that post hadnt been collected. A 10-year-old neighbour told the summons server that he believed she had gone back to her mothers house in another county. Ms Forde agreed with Remy Farrell SC, also acting on behalf of the inquiry, instructed by McDowell Purcell Solicitors, that it was correct to say that, after the teacher withdrew consent to be contacted by phone, it was impossible to effect delivery by post. Although a public hearing, all details relating to the identity of the teacher, school and witness are anonymous. The teacher was first registered in 2006 as a post-primary teacher and, at the time of the alleged incident, was on probationary registration as a primary teacher. The hearing is being conducted by the professional standards body for the profession, the Teaching Council, which has more than 90,000 registered members. The hearing is being conducted by a three person panel, two of whom are teachers and members both of the Teaching Council and its disciplinary committee. The chair of the panel is Denis Magner, a teacher and the second teacher is Eamonn Shaughnessy. The third member is Aine Lynch, director of the National Parents Council (Primary) Two days have been set aside for the hearing, the first under legislation that was enacted last year. Such hearings, similar to those conducted for doctors and nurses, will investigate cases of underperformance and serious misconduct. To reach a hearing, a complaint has to go through a Teaching Council Investigation Committee, which decides whether it merits being forwarded to a Disciplinary Committee. Complaints that are considered frivolous or vexatious will not progress to a formal hearing. In extreme cases, teachers may be "struck off" the professional register. Lesser penalties, include suspension, admonishment or an offer of support to improve performance. Experience in Scotland and Wales suggests in Ireland up to 30 teachers a year could face a disciplinary hearing. To date, the Teaching Council has received about 50 complaints under the legislation. About half of the complaints have been refused and the remainder are at different stages in the investigation and disciplinary process. A large number of that initial batch of cases are legacy complaints that were awaiting the enactment of Fitness to Teach legislation in July 2016. The default position is that Teaching Council hearings will be heard in public, but any party can request private, partly private or public but anonymised and it is up to the hearing panel to decide. THE attack on an Offaly farmer by a burglary gang has been described as "very serious and unacceptable" by Justice Minister Charlie Flanagan. The minister was responding to claims in the Dail that marauding gangs are changing their methods to outwit gardai and operating with impunity. Fianna Fail leader Micheal Martin said there has been "a very significant increase in the number of homes in rural areas being attacked and burgled". He said people had "listened in horror" to the story of 54-year-old Richie McKelvey who was assaulted in his home in Brosna, outside Birr, Co Offaly earlier this week. Gardai have appealed for information on his four attackers, saying they had Munster accents and used a high-powered 4X4 vehicle. Mr Martin said: "The gangs are well known to the Garda. They have become quite sophisticated in how they organise themselves. Apparently they no longer use the motorways but use the older primary routes." He said rural communities "do not feel secure". "They do not believe enough is being done. CCTV is very limited on motorways. The Garda presence is historically down. "Many rural Garda stations are closed. They have not had the same fortune as Stepaside," Mr Martin added in reference to the station in Transport Minister Shane Rosss constituency which is to be reopened. Offaly TD Carol Noland said that while official figures dont point to a rise in burglaries, the reality on the ground is different. She claimed Garda cars are parked outside stations in Offaly "because there are not enough gardai to drive those cars and to patrol areas". Tipperary TD Mattie McGrath said: "The perpetrators of these crimes are operating with impunity." In response the Justice Minister said Operation Thor, which targets these criminals, "is continuing unabated". Mr Flanagan said 3m is available for CCTV over the next three years. "I advise communities that they should consider making appropriate application to my Department. "I am anxious to ensure that this money is expended, particularly across rural areas," he said. The minister disputed that Garda cars are sitting unused. Commenting on the incident in Birr, he said: "There is a determination on the part of local gardai, with whom I have spoken, to bring the perpetrators to justice." A Garda manhunt has been launched for a dangerous Kinahan cartel member, who is wanted in relation to an elaborate murder plot that was foiled in the capital. On Monday night, heavily armed detectives from the Emergency Response Unit (ERU) intercepted a car in the north inner city and seized a loaded Beretta pistol fitted with a silencer. Four well-known criminals were arrested for conspiring to murder violent drug dealer Gary Hanley (38), who has close links to the Hutch organised crime gang. The Irish Independent can reveal that: Gardai are still attempting to track down a 33-year-old cartel member, who they suspect played a prominent role in orchestrating the murder plot. The Blackrock home of a 39-year-old cartel associate, who is suspected of involvement in the conspiracy but hasn't been arrested, was searched. A number of the Hutch mob's high-level members made contact with the intended target yesterday and have threatened to strike back against the cartel. Extra security was yesterday put in place at the garda stations where the arrested men were being questioned over fears that Hutch associates would attempt an attack. The surveillance operation that led to the arrests had been ongoing for several months and involved the monitoring of cars and houses by specialist detectives. As part of Monday night's massive bust, 10 properties were searched and seven vehicles were also seized to be forensically examined. Gardai were last night attempting to track down the well-known member of the Kinahan cartel, who is suspected of playing a prominent role in the murder plot. This 33-year-old criminal has been involved with organised crime groups since his teens and is suspected of carrying out a number of attacks for the cartel. It has also emerged that a 39-year-old man, who lives in the leafy Blackrock area, is suspected of being involved in the murder plot. He has been linked to the Kinahan cartel for a number of years and his home was searched as part of the probe into Monday night's foiled murder. Last night, detectives were continuing to question the four well-known Dublin criminals for allegedly conspiring to murder Hutch gang associate Hanley (28). Those detained include a volatile 38-year-old hitman for hire, who was only recently released from prison. European Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager has warned she has been given "no indication" of when Ireland will begin to collect 13bn in back tax from Apple. Last month, Ms Vestager announced that the Commission would take court-enforcement action against Ireland over failure to collect the tax money, which is under appeal by both Ireland and Apple. Irish officials insist they are still working to comply with the Commission ruling, which will involve calculating the exact amount to be owed before setting up an escrow account. However, Ms Vestager says she is still unclear about the timeframe by which Dublin will collect the 13bn. "We have no indication when it comes to the time perspective in recovering the unpaid taxes from Apple," she told the Irish Independent at the Web Summit in Lisbon. "We do have from the Irish Government the progress made when it comes to figuring out how to deal with such amounts of recovered taxes. I respect the complexities of how to keep 13bn while the court case takes place. "But we need to see progress when it comes to making the recovery because we have seen that the Belgians have done it, the Dutch have done it and Luxembourg has done it in terms of recovery. Because of equal treatment, we expect the Irish to do it." Government officials had reportedly been told by Ms Vestager's department that court action would be withdrawn if a start to collecting the money was made by the end of 2017. Read More Asked about this, Ms Vestager said that she would judge the situation as it progressed. "We'll take the decision as we see how the Irish are moving forward," she said. Ms Vestager also said that while the Commission had not been in contact with Apple since the launch of the 'Paradise Papers', it had been in communication with the tech giant over its reorganised structure. She said it was too early to say whether the 'Paradise Papers' might prompt another probe of Apple. "It is very early days in that respect," she said. "Knowing how Apple is organised now, it remains to be seen if more cases come from the 'Paradise Papers'. We have taken an interest in getting to know how Apple is organised now and we did that before the publication of the 'Paradise Papers'. "The 'Paradise Papers' was launched yesterday and the day before so we've had no contact since the 'Paradise Papers'." Two widows are at war over where they want their late husband to be buried. Northern Ireland native Olive Murphy (92) had a romance with Paul Morigi during World War Two, eventually marrying him in 1944. However, they divorced in 1948 when Ms Murphy did not want to move with him back to America as she feared being separated from her family. That same year, Mr Morigi met and married fellow American Muriel Morigi, now aged 96, and they had two children during six decades of marriage. But it would seem Mr Morigi could never quite forget Olive, his "first and last love", and he left America in 2011 aged 92 to remarry her in East Sussex where she had moved to. When he died just before Christmas last year, Ms Murphy assumed she would be able to bury him in the local cemetery where she had purchased a plot for him. But his US family expected to bring his body back to America, over 3,500 miles away. His son had died before him, in 2009, and they wanted Mr Morigi to be buried alongside him. The bitter argument that followed has seen Mr Morigi's daughter, Karolyn Morigi-Armstrong, and his four grandchildren win an injunction against him being buried in the UK. His body has been in storage at an undertakers in Sussex ever since. Ms Morigi-Armstrong denied that his moving to England had resulted in a "serious breakdown" between their family and her father, but admitted to accusing Olive of taking her elderly father away from his family. Now the dispute over where the multi-millionaire should be buried has reached the High Court in London. Joshua Swirsky, for Ms Murphy, said that the feelings of Mr Morigi's American relatives must be outweighed by the wishes of his British widow. "His widow, Olive Murphy, wants to be near his grave," he told the judge. "If he is buried in the US, given her age and state of health, she will never be able to visit the grave, "In the ordinary course of events, a person would be expected to want to be buried with their spouse rather than other family, even adult children. "The US family want him to be buried with them, in order that they can visit the grave and Paul Morigi can be near to his dead son. While it is accepted that these are considerations for the court, it is submitted that they are outweighed by the wishes of the widow." Karolyn Morigi-Armstrong, who worked in banking alongside her father, said he would never have wanted to be buried in England "thousands of miles away from all his family and against his express wishes". "He obviously moved across the pond, but he wanted to be buried next to my brother on the site he prepared himself," she told the judge. "We would have a military funeral for him. He was a commanding officer in World War Two and that was very important for him." Health Minister Simon Harris has refused to rule out introducing a system of compulsory vaccines for health workers. Speaking at the launch of the Governments Winter Ready campaign, Mr Harris said the take-up of such vaccines among nurses is particularly low. The Wicklow TD said this is in stark contrasts to doctors, who receive the vaccine in high numbers. Mr Harris told reporters that he is optimistic that there will be uptake in the vaccine among healthcare workers. But he refused to rule out making it mandatory. Id rather not have to, quite frankly. But I do have an open mind in relation to that, Mr Harris said. The uptake varies across healthcare professionals. Doctors have quite a high uptake traditionally. Nurses have had a very low uptake. So theres urgency in the message that our nurses have to get vaccinated this year, he added. Meanwhile, Mr Harris said there is no evidence of the so-called aussie flu reaching Ireland, despite media reports. The flu has had a particularly serious impact in Australia. In relation to the aussie flu, theres no evidence so far that that strain of flu is in Ireland, Mr Harris said. In fact, theres some evidence that that strain of flu is very similar to the strain of flu we had last winter. We actually had a very bad winter, it wasnt very remarked upon much, but we had a flu that particularly impacted upon elderly people. The minister said he has initiated a bed capacity review in line of best international practice, adding that 57,000 more people visited the countrys emergency departments last year compared to 2015. Thats roughly the size of county Carlow, he added. Learner driver Susan Gleeson wept in court as she apologised to the Clancy family Photo: Daragh McSweeney/Provision Driving instructors say young drivers are picking up bad habits. Photo: Getty Images. Check that both your documentation and car are in order before turning up for your driving test Car owners who permit learner drivers to use their vehicles unaccompanied face prosecution for the first time under new measures being brought to Cabinet today. Transport Minister Shane Ross will also seek approval to give gardai the power to seize vehicles on the spot - if a learner driver is driving unaccompanied, the Irish Independent is reporting. Other potential penalties include a fine of 2,000 and six months in prison. The exact penalties still require final approval by the Attorney General. The proposals are being dubbed the "Clancy amendment" - in recognition of a campaign by Cork man Noel Clancy. His wife, Geraldine Clancy and their daughter, Louise Ann, were drowned three days before Christmas 2015 after a collision with a learner driver in Co Cork. The accident happened less than 1km from the Clancy's family farm. The driver, Susan Gleeson (21) pleaded guilty before Cork Circuit Criminal Court to dangerous driving causing the death of Geraldine (58) and, Louise Ann (22). Expand Close Cork farmer Noel Clancy has fronted a campaign for tougher enforcement of regulations on learner drivers. Photo: Daragh McSweeney / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Cork farmer Noel Clancy has fronted a campaign for tougher enforcement of regulations on learner drivers. Photo: Daragh McSweeney Ms Gleeson, a neighbour of the family, was given a three year suspended prison sentence. Tragically, one of the first to arrive on the scene in a bid to help shortly after 11am that day was Noel Clancy. Expand Close Geraldine Clancy and her daughter Louise Ann Clancy / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Geraldine Clancy and her daughter Louise Ann Clancy He initially didn't recognise the overturned Ford as their family car - and was shocked minutes later to discover his wife and daughter had both died. The move comes ahead of a Dail debate next week on a mandatory drink-driving ban. Expand Close Learner driver Susan Gleeson wept in court as she apologised to the Clancy family Photo: Daragh McSweeney/Provision / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Learner driver Susan Gleeson wept in court as she apologised to the Clancy family Photo: Daragh McSweeney/Provision For the first time drivers will be put off the road for three months if they are found to have reached a blood-alcohol limit of 50-80mg per 100ml. A devoted mum who was told by the HSE to call the gardai if her son - who has severe autism - gets frustrated has said that "the system is broken." Jane Johnstone has said that she is desperate to keep her family together but that getting any kind of State support is a "battle." Jane lives in Kilmore Quay in Co Wexford with her sons Evan and Daniel, who both have severe autism; her daughter Ciara (19) is studying in Dublin and Jane's husband Rod passed away suddenly three years ago. She told Independent.ie: "Evan (17) is non-verbal and he is stimulated by his environment and gets very claustrophobic and frustrated if he is out of his routine and confined to the house for a long period of time, it's difficult for him to cope with. "When he is overwhelmed we do see challenging behaviour and his safety and the safety of other family members is at risk. "My husband Rod died very suddenly three years ago, he had a massive cardiac arrest and collapsed on the kitchen floor. Expand Close Jane with her late husband Rod and their children (L-R) Evan, Daniel and Ciara / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Jane with her late husband Rod and their children (L-R) Evan, Daniel and Ciara "It is quite a difficult situation, I have struggled to keep my family together and we very much depend on the small amount of support that we get. "Obtaining that support has been very difficult, I have had to go to some extreme lengths, I've even had to protest outside of our local HSE office, so there has been very little time to grieve. "All my energy goes on holding my family together, my only focus is that I can't lose anybody else, I want to keep my boys at home but we are dependent on respite services to keep everything ticking along and even at that it's challenging, but those boys have my heart and soul." She said that after Evan was diagnosed with a degenerative eye condition, that has left him with just 40 per cent vision, she asked the HSE for extra help. She explained: "I asked for help to bring him to hospital appointments - obviously I also have another autistic child who would need to be cared for. "One of the main options given to me was home-from-home care, so a foster care system, I had only asked for a few hours and to help with emergency situations so I felt it was inappropriate. "The next incident happened in August - which is a very difficult month for us, both of my sons go to a special school in Enniscorthy and that's closed in August and with everyone looking for respite service resources are very thin on the ground. "I was concerned and spoke to the HSE well in advance, I was given eight hours support for Evan per week, it's not an awful lot but I'm grateful and it managed to keep our heads over water. Expand Close Ciara and Evan / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Ciara and Evan "The last week in the month there was a communication issue between the HSE and the service provider and basically we were left to deal with it, we had five days where there was no respite at all. "I was concerned about how this could affect Evan's behaviour and how I would cope with keeping himself and everyone else safe. "It's important to stress that Evan has no control over his behaviour but providing this service would preempt behavioural issues but the HSE said there was nothing they could do and they suggested if he became overwhelmed and there was a problem with his behaviour I should call the gardai." Read More She said that she was stunned by the suggestion and said that it would only make things worse if Evan was stressed. Jane said: "I was deeply offended by that - Evan hasn't broken any laws, he is a vulnerable young man and I don't think he would even understand what a guard is. "To bring guards in here would only escalate the situation and in fairness to thee gardai they're not trained to deal with an autistic 17 year-old. "I was told at that point they could refer me to Tusla without my consent, I've never had anything to do with Tusla but my understanding of Tusla is that parents are referred to Tusla is if they are neglectful or abusive, which I can say hand on heart that I'm not." She has complained to the HSE and wants an apology but was told that this is their policy. She is also worried that when Evan turns 18 next year he could lose some of the servies he has. She said: "My biggest concern is that everything I have fought for is going to come to an end on May 1 when Evan turns 18, he'll lose his child respite services but we don't know yet what adults services are available. "It's challenging but we manage it, if you take away the services that hold us together I would be very concerned." She said that people with autism and their families are treated badly by the State and more resources need to be made available to support them. Jane said: "It's not just my family, this is a problem for families across Ireland, it's the basic stuff that allows our children to develop, everything is a battle and no is always the first answer so you have to fight for them. Expand Close Daniel with Rod, weeks before he died / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Daniel with Rod, weeks before he died "Families like mine are very isolated, we have to spend a lot of time locked in the house because the two boys need constant supervision so it's just not safe to bring them out by myself. "I feel segregated, if Evan could speak I know what he wants is the same as any 17-year-old boy, he just wants to be part of the community and to find his place in the world but the system doesn't allow it. "As a society we are better than this, this is not in the people's name and I think people want us to be part of the bigger picture but it's the system that's broken. "We have such a huge health budget but it's just not reaching the people, I don't get excited when I hear there is going o be extra funding for respite because I know it won't make a difference to us." Read More A spokesman for the HSE said that they are working with people with autism and their loved ones. He told Independent.ie: "The HSE wants to assure the public that its community services are there to care and support those who require our services. "The HSE acknowledges the difficulties faced by some families and will continue to liaise with them to resolve issues that arise. In this instance, HSE staff are in contact with the family directly in order to support them on an on-going basis. "The welfare of patients, clients, service users and their families in Co. Wexford is important to the HSE. Our community services are working to ensure that, within our existing resources, people have access to our services. "The HSE encourages any individuals and/or their families, who may have an issue with the service they are receiving, to make contact with the services concerned and the matter will be discussed directly with them." Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has pledged to reform the State's planning system on the back of the controversy surrounding Apple's plans to open up an 850m site in Galway. Mr Varadkar told his parliamentary party meeting that the current law could be changed before Christmas to ensure an a more streamlined process for proposed data centres. He said there are data centres across the country, citing Amazon and Facebook. But he rejected a proposal from junior minister Sean Kyne for a designated court for planning applications from major multi national firms. Despite the Apple deal being in serious doubt, Mr Varadkar insisted the Government is not giving up on attracting the massive investment. "Leo was clear the process needs to be simpler - but he was clear the Apple deal is still alive," said one source present. Meanwhile, Mr Varadkar told TDs his speech at the Fine Gael Ard Fheis would focus on government achievements and plans for the future, rather than criticising the opposition. Mr Varadkar has been criticised in recent weeks for his ferocious attacks on Sinn Fein. A source said: "Leo made clear that he would focus instead on what we have done and will do, not the faults of the opposition." Education Minister Richard Bruton also addressed the meeting, saying he is developing a document called the "Republic of Opportunity" which will map out Ireland's future until 2025. Slum landlords will be prosecuted under tough new reforms of the rental sector, Housing Minister Eoghan Murphy has promised. The Fine Gael representative has revealed that the owners of unsafe rental accommodation will face stricter penalties. He was speaking following exposes by Independent.ie and RTE's Prime Time Investigates, which have shown some of the overcrowded and unsafe properties that are available to rent. Minister Murphy said: "A landlord can currently provide sub standard accommodation without being subject to a penalty. "This has to change, and it will change as part of reform of this sector." He said that these changes have been prioritised and the new regulations will be in place within two years. He was speaking in the Dail yesterday following a query by Sinn Fein's Housing spokesman Eoin O Broin. Read More Deputy O Broin said: "(There is) no sanction under legislation for initial breaches of the law by landlords. "A landlord who crams people in like sardines can avoid any sanctions if they comply with the initial approval notice, there needs to be a change and a comprehensive review of the sanctions for landlords who break the rules. "It should include the clear possibility of imprisonment for landlords who put people's lives at risk for a first offence." Read More Mr O Broin said that local authorities will need extra funding to help facilitate them to carry out inspections. He said: "If rogue landlords know their chances of being inspected are low, then abuses are going to occur. "Increasing levels of inspections will require additional resources. "An NCT stely certification would ensure that law abiding landlords were not undercut by rogue landlords." Loopholes in the tax system will always exist because trying to stay ahead of "smart tax lawyers" is a "game of cat and mouse", Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said. Responding to the revelations in the Paradise Papers, the Taoiseach denied Ireland had done a "sweetheart deal" with technology giant Apple. However, he said the Revenue Commissioners would examine the content of the papers. "If further action is required against any person or company, it will be taken. It is important to point out that the Revenue Commissioners have been very active and effective in this area already," Mr Varadkar said. "In the past couple of years alone, the Revenue Commissioners have collected 1bn from targeting offshore operations by companies." The Taoiseach also argued that Ireland is one of just 22 countries in the world designated by the OECD as "entirely compliant with tax transparency". He added: "There are very smart tax lawyers out there who go through legislation looking for loopholes to exploit. It is never going to be the case that there will be no loopholes. We must keep on closing them." He was responding to Social Democrats' co-leader Roisin Shortall, who accused the Government of a "cop-out" on the issue by trying to claim tax avoidance is an international problem. She questioned whether a capital allowance regime introduced last year was done so in order to help companies that previously registered themselves as stateless to continue cutting taxes. She said that "the facilitation of Apple's tax arrangements by successive governments" had had a "considerably negative impact" on Ireland's reputation abroad. TAOISEACH Leo Varadkar has worn a 'Shamrock Poppy' in the Dail to "recognise Irish soldiers who fought in World War I." The move is a first for the leader of Fine Gael and is likely to spark debate over how the Irishmen and women who served in the British army are remembered. Mr Varadkars predecessor Enda Kenny broke new ground in 2012 when he took part in a Remembrance Day event but he declined to wear the poppy. More than 200,000 Irish men and women served in the British forces during World War I between 1914 and 1918. Taoiseach is wearing a poppy-shamrock in the Dail chamber today pic.twitter.com/o0j75SdN3U Gavan Reilly (@gavreilly) November 7, 2017 The emblem worn by the Taoiseach today shows a poppy laid on top of a shamrock and was supplied by the Irish branch of the Royal Legion. A spokesperson for Mr Varadkar said: "The Taoiseach was given the Shamrock Poppy by Senator Frank Feighan and the issue has also been supported by Senator Neale Richmond. "The Shamrock Poppy recognises Irish soldiers who fought in World War I. It was commissioned to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Great War by the Irish branch of the Royal British Region to remember the 206,000 Irishmen that fought, 26,500 of whom died in battle." Proceeds from the Shamrock Poppy go to Irish veterans and their families, and towards the upkeep to memorials to Irish soldiers in Ireland. All money stays in Ireland. Taoiseach Leo Varadkar wearing a Shamrock Poppy in the Dail, similar to the one pictured inset Taoiseach Leo Varadkar wore a 'Shamrock Poppy' in the Dail on Tuesday to "recognise Irish soldiers who fought in World War I" sparking debate. The move was a first for a Fine Gael leader and has sparked debate about whether Mr Varadkar was correct to wear the pin in the Dail chamber. Taoiseach is wearing a poppy-shamrock in the Dail chamber today pic.twitter.com/o0j75SdN3U Gavan Reilly (@gavreilly) November 7, 2017 Senator Frank Feighan, who gave Mr Varadkar the Shamrock Poppy, said this morning he believed "middle Ireland" should be able to reclaim certain symbols. Speaking on Morning Ireland today Mr Feighan said: "I felt that over the years we airbrushed the sacrifice of these young Irish men." He said he previously wore a poppy into the Dail and noted that he comes from a very Republican background. He said he felt that history needed to be "balanced". "We are a mature and confident republic now and we are in a position now where we can reflect on the sacrifices and the commemorations of all things in Irish history." When asked what he would say to those who were offended by the wearing of the symbol in the chamber he said: "Over the years we maybe allowed certain symbols to be taken over by certain groups, I think middle Ireland out there have a right now to commemorate Irish men and Irish women over the many years from both sides of our traditions." We asked Independent.ie readers if they agreed with Mr Varadkar's decision to wear the pin and a majority said they agreed with his decision. More than 8,000 votes were cast. A majority, 71pc, of voters said they agreed with Taoiseach Leo Varadkar wearing a 'shamrock poppy' in the Dail. When asked about its significance yesterday a spokesman for the Taoiseach said: "The Shamrock Poppy recognises Irish soldiers who fought in World War I. It was commissioned to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Great War by the Irish branch of the Royal British Region to remember the 206,000 Irishmen that fought, 26,500 of whom died in battle." Proceeds from the Shamrock Poppy go to Irish veterans and their families, and towards the upkeep to memorials to Irish soldiers in Ireland. All money stays in Ireland. Independent.ie readers may cast one vote per device Gardai in Balbriggan are investigating Two missing brothers have been "located safe and well". Gardai confirmed this evening that five-year-old Arnel Azad and his two-year-old brother Ayaan Azad have been located. Gardai in Limerick appealed for the public's help last Thursday when the boys were reported missing. The National Bus and Rail Union, SIPTU and Unite will all attend the Labour Court tomorrow for talks about the Irish Rail dispute. It is expected that the Labour Court will ask for the impending strikes in November and December to be called off. However, the NBRU has cautioned that as far as it is concerned, the strikes are still going ahead. Yesterday was the second 24-hour stoppage in the space of a week - with further strikes expected on November 14, November 23 and December 8. NBRU General Secretary, Dermot O'Leary said in a statement: "Whilst accepting that the Labour Courts invitation is a potential step forward in attempting to resolve this debilitating and unnecessary dispute, it should be borne in mind that the intransigence displayed by Irish Rail management, led it should be said by the CEO, together with tacit support from the Department of Transport, will make an overall resolution to this dispute more difficult than it might otherwise have been, had the company (over recent weeks), acted in an appropriate manner, with both its own staff and the States third party industrial relations institutions. "The extraordinary statement by the Taoiseach in the Dail yesterday, where he singled out the State-owned Coras Iompair Eireann Group of companies by suggesting it is 'always necessary' to have a few days of strikes, (when other transport links do not result in that), neglecting to mention that our colleagues in the privately operated Luas were involved in 12 days of strikes in their pay dispute, clearly demonstrated a Blueshirt bias at the heart of Government against the State-owned public transport providers. "The awarding of State contracts, (by the NTA), which contain little or no provision for pay rises is a matter that will require to be urgently addressed. "The alternative is that the spectre of public transport disputes, creating economic hardship in their wake, will hang over the country in the months and years ahead." SIPTU representatives will also be in attendance at the Labour Court hearing on Thursday morning. Transport Division Organiser, Greg Ennis said they are attending the hearing with a view to achieving an acceptable resolution of the pay dispute. Meanwhile, Iarnrod Eireann has welcomed the invitation to the hearing tomorrow concerning the dispute over pay. Irish Rail workers want a 3.75pc a year pay rise over three years, to match wage hikes recently given to Luas and Dublin Bus workers. Talks had been ongoing between unions and company management at the Workplace Relations Commission earlier this month, but they failed to reach an agreement. Prayers are being said for a young father who is in a critical condition in intensive care after falling 22ft off a roof. Joiner Martyn Lewis (32), from Woodvale in north Belfast, sustained serious injuries and is fighting for his life in the Royal Victoria Hospital. He had been working on a roof on Saturday with his father, Jim, when the "freak accident" happened. The exact details of the incident have not yet been disclosed but he is understood to have suffered a broken back, and chest and head injuries. Mr Lewis and his partner Pauline McCaw are parents to six-year-old daughter Brook and are expecting their second child in nine weeks' time. Described as popular and hard-working, Mr Lewis is in a coma but remains in a "comfortable position". Speaking on behalf of the family, Robert McKee thanked well-wishers for their support. "Martyn is a really nice guy - he'd do anything to help anyone, he'd go out of his way for you," he said. "He's a real hard worker and he's devoted to his family - he just loves them. "Brook is his wee princess and he just loves Pauline, he works every minute sent to him to provide for them. "It's awful what's happened but on behalf of the family I know they would want me to thank the community for everything that they have done and are doing to help. "The community has rallied around and they really appreciate the support and people standing by them." Pastor Jonathan Clarke from the Welcome Evangelical Church posted a request on his Facebook page on Monday night asking for people around the world to pray for Mr Lewis's recovery, and has been pleased by the response. "Martyn is comfortable at the minute - there is no real change," added Pastor Clarke. "The family want to make it clear that they really appreciate everyone who has contacted them and those who are also praying and thinking of them. "Over the last 24 hours they have certainly valued the power of prayer, as you can appreciate it is a very stressful time for them." An Irish mother-of-three has singled out one of this years most popular toys as a waste of money. Adrienne Halls daughter received a LOL Surprise Doll Assorted Series 2 as a gift from her grandmother, which she had bought for 11.99. The toy comes in the form of a ball, with seven surprises to be found inside. My mother gave it to my daughter who was five, and we just thought, for 12, it was the biggest load of tat wed ever seen. My daughter got a tiny doll, a bottle, something that looked like a hair band - which was so tiny that youd nearly throw in the bin, a shell that comes apart, and a few stickers. When you think of what you actually get, 12 is a lot of money for that. Its not value for money. Expand Close LOL Surprise! Doll Assorted Series 2 / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp LOL Surprise! Doll Assorted Series 2 Its like a kinder egg for all intents and purposes. I just feel its very, very tacky. My five-year-old never bothered with it much. The larger version on many Irish childrens Santa wish lists this year costs 72.99. It features 50 surprises, including a collectable doll, clothes and accessories. Adrienne, from Dublin, said she has discouraged her daughter from asking for it for Christmas. The bigger version, on the basis of the other one, is obviously bigger and better but its still just a load of tat. 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 Its very, very bad value for money, especially when the kids are collecting them - they just want them to collect because thats what the friends in school are doing. The same child that didnt want them thought shed collect them for Christmas. Its just the thing to have. Its one of the worst things Ive ever seen in terms of value for the money. Theres a lot better you could get with that. To me, even for 40, you could get something that can be handed down. Like if a child wanted a lego set for 200 I wouldnt mind paying for that because its value for money. Im all about quality toys, having had three children, I dont mind the good quality toys like wooden dolls houses. This week, a mother in the UK garnered a huge reaction online when she blasted the LOL Surprise Big Surprise. So Elisa got the LOL big surprise today. I would definitely not recommend if you don't want to waste your money. The pic on the right is all you get, just pre warning yas (bucket not included), she said on Facebook. A spokesperson from L.O.L. Surprise said: "L.OL Surprise is currently the best selling toy in the UK and a number of other countries. Prices range from 5.99 for the L.O.L Tots to 72.99 for the Big Surprise. The L.O.L Big Surprise contains 50 exclusive surprises that cant be found in other L.O.L products which individually are valued higher than the total RRP. *Adrienne Hall changed her name for the article I was recently on the receiving end of what I can only describe as motorway bullying. It is the most horrible sensation and I can only imagine what it must be like for others who have to endure it on a daily basis. I suffered it for a few hours for motoring purposes but I wouldnt want to have to go through it again. Just because I chose - for perfectly legitimate reasons - to drive on the inside lane at 90kmh (no more) for most of the journey from Dublin to Galway, I was exposed to a thoroughly nasty side of human behaviour. Id go so far as to say I was treated like a second-class citizen. The number of times I was beeped, flashed at and given the fingers by drivers closing in on my rear bumper or overtaking was chilling. Several rude 4x4 and lorry drivers nearly swept me off the road by cutting in sharply in front after overtaking. I had to brake and swerve to avoid a collision with one so-and-so who seemed to take a perverse pleasure in forcing me into my emergency manoeuvre. Im not exaggerating: it was either a matter of braking and swerving onto the hard shoulder or have my Renault ZOE electric car badly damaged. Why for Gods sake? There was loads of room. The road wasnt that busy. It was a bright morning. Was it just because they had to go to the bother of overtaking? Or is there a more sinister side? Are some drivers latent bullies? Yes, the top speed permitted on most of the roads I traversed was either 100kmh or 120kmh. But that doesnt mean we all have to go that fast. Limits merely denote the upper end of speed under ideal driving conditions. We lose sight of that. I think 90kmh is a decent, steady speed on the inside lane for many people. I wasnt hogging the outside channel like so many do. People could slip by easily without fuss. But the rudeness and impatience of so many was disconcerting. I thought of, and feel pity for, all those who, for whatever reason, drive at 90kmh or below. We cant just steamroll people into going faster than they are capable of, or wish to do. Thats a recipe for an accident. Theres no need for the hostility. None. I had to take it as a once-off but how many must dread having to do so on a regular basis? What are we coming to at all when someone who chooses their own safe speed can be bullied so relentlessly? I won't forget my few hours of persecution for a long time. Those killed in road accidents will be remembered World Day of Remembrance is commemorated on the third Sunday of November each year. It is the day when we remember the millions killed and injured on the world's roads, together with their families, friends and many others who were affected. It is also a day on which we thank the emergency services for the work they do each and every day, both in making our roads safer and in dealing with the aftermath of collisions. Road deaths and injuries are sudden, violent and traumatic. Their impact is long-lasting and widespread. While road deaths are counted in the year they occur, a family remains bereaved forever. Many others remain deeply affected by the loss of a friend, colleague or neighbour. The effect on the emergency services, whose work involves facing the consequences of crashes on a daily basis, is also profound. Each year, the RSA highlights this day of commemoration with a reception for those families whose loved ones were killed or seriously injured and road traffic victims groups who have done so much to support the promotion of road safety. We will be marking World Day of Remembrance for the eleventh time on Sunday, November 19, while the RSA's launch event will be held in Smock Alley Theatre on Thursday, November 16. Of all the events the RSA organises, the launch of World Day of Remembrance is particularly special. It's an opportunity for families and friends to reflect and remember their loved ones. This gathering serves as a poignant reminder of the importance of a continued focus on road safety to prevent the loss of more lives and to avoid other families experiencing the grief and devastation of losing a loved one. As well as the launch event in Dublin, remembrance services and ceremonies will be held across the country on Sunday, November 19, with members of An Garda Siochana, county councils, emergency services and victim support groups joining with the RSA. More than 24,000 people have died on roads in Ireland since we began recording in 1959. After a disappointing spike in road deaths last year, events like this one, we hope, will serve as a catalyst for us all to think about how we use the roads. Let's make 2017 a safer year on our roads. Events Sunday, November 19 * Cork: Remembrance service takes place in the Cathedral of St Mary and St Anne, Roman Street (Shandon), Cork city at 11.30am. * Cavan: A special memorial event will take place in Castle Saunderson, Belturbet, Cavan, from 2pm to 4pm. * Dublin: A special memorial Mass will be celebrated in St Michan's Church, Halston Street, Dublin 7, at 11am. * Galway: A commemoration to remember all road traffic victims in the Clayton Hotel, Galway, at 2pm. * Kerry: A special Mass for road victims at 9am in St Mary's Church, Listowel, and in St. Mary's Cathedral, New Street, Killarney, at 12pm. * Louth: A special memorial Mass will be celebrated in the Augustinian Church, Drogheda, at 1.15pm. * Mayo: There will be a service at Knock Shrine at noon. * Waterford: A special commemoration in the Tower Hotel, Waterford, at 2pm. * Westmeath: The Irish Road Victims' Association is hosting a memorial service for road traffic victims in the Belvedere and Uisneach suites, Bloomfield House Hotel, Mullingar, at 2pm. Details of all events can be found on www.rsa.ie All of a sudden getting around Ireland in an electric vehicle (EV) looks like it is going to be a lot easier as it can be revealed today that up to six more high-power charging (HPC) stations will be built here next year. And each site will have up to six charge points. It is the result of a major agreement to substantially expand the charging network for EVs across Europe. In Ireland the deal involves Topaz installing between four and six HPCs at strategic locations around the country. The development follows the recent major announcement of the IONITY joint venture. This involves the BMW Group, Daimler AG, Ford and the Volkswagen Group, with Audi and Porsche, developing an HPC network for EVs across the continent. Those behind the plan are committing to having 400 such stations up and running by 2020. The IONITY plan is, simply put, designed to make long-distance journeys easier and quicker without range anxiety or lengthy charging times. Based in Munich, the number of staff involved will increase to 50 by next year. By the end of this year, they estimate 20 stations will be opened - on major roads in Germany, Norway and Austria, at 120km intervals. That will expand to more than 100 stations over the next year. They will allow for several customers, driving different brands, to charge at the same time. The network will have a capacity of up to 350kW per charging point and will use the European standard combined charging system to "significantly reduce charging times". Circle K, the global fuel and convenience retail chain of which Topaz has been a part since its acquisition in December 2015, has agreed a partnership with IONITY to install the charging network. As you know, the ESB currently operates our EV charging infrastructure. Of the 90 ESB fast chargers currently here, 42pc are at Topaz sites. The majority are 50kW, through which you can get an 80pc charge in 25 minutes. They have also added the Tesla 125 kW supercharger this year - the first in the country - at Ballacolla, Co Laois. It is not clear where Topaz will establish its super-charging stations, but they will obviously be strategically positioned to give maximum benefit and provide EV owners with a measure of certainty that they can take on big mileage and replenish quickly. On that point, IONITY has said of its Europe-wide plan: "Choosing the best locations takes into account potential integration with existing charging technologies." It says it is negotiating with "existing infrastructure initiatives, including those supported by the participating companies as well as political institutions". Renault claims it has developed technology that allows a car to swerve and avoid obstacles. They say it performs as well as professional drivers. The industry-first technology has been demonstrated in a Renault Zoe. Tested against the reactions of professional drivers, the car avoided unexpected road obstacles and cones every bit as effectively as the humans. Obviously this is regarded as another significant step towards full autonomy. The brand aims to have 15 models with a range of autonomy on sale within the next five years (See: 'What makes a driverless car?' P2). MY COAST TO COAST ELECTRIC CAR DRIVE THE challenge was to drive coast to coast on one charge in Renault's Zoe. Read my account of the journey from Dublin to Galway - and back - in Saturday's Irish Independent Review. Comfort and consolidation were the buzzwords at the recent unveiling of the new Citroen C4 Cactus in Paris. Consolidation in that the new car, which will go on sale in the second half of next year, will replace not just the existing C4 Cactus, but also the regular C4 hatchback. Meanwhile comfort, together with design, is now firmly at the centre of the French brand's core targets. "We're taking a 21st century approach to comfort and design," Citroen CEO Linda Jackson told the Irish Independent at the launch. Expand Close The chairs feature high-density foam / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp The chairs feature high-density foam Comfort means more than 'comfort'. In the current context it also includes the likes of connectivity, acoustics and even the ease of going to a dealership for purchasing or servicing. Although ostensibly a mid-life makeover of the existing Cactus, the new car heralds significant changes to both styling and engineering, with the comfort focus manifesting itself via two key areas. Most notably, it will become the first car in Europe to have Citroen's Progressive Hydraulic Cushion (PHC) suspension. Instead of traditional rubber bump stops, PHC uses secondary hydraulic dampers that progressively limit wheel travel at the extremes. This also enables softer, comfort-oriented springs and dampers to be fitted. Also on the comfort agenda are the seats, with new chairs featuring high-density foam that retains shape for longer and offers strong postural support. We tried them out at the launch - they do seem exceptionally comfy. The need to appeal to the broader family hatchback market brings a more conventional appearance to the Cactus. Notably the signature Airbumps that feature so prominently on the current model have been moved further down the body to the side sills. Citroen admitted they had become a divisive issue amongst customers. The front has had a makeover to bring it firmly in line with recent models such as the C3 Aircross crossover. The other obvious change is that roof rails are no longer standard. Redesigned LED tail-lights, meanwhile, also help give the car a more mainstream hatchback appearance. Engines will be largely as before, but one addition is set to be a range-topping 130bhp version of the 1.2-litre three-cylinder PureTech petrol. Looking to the future, Ms Jackson told us there will ultimately be eight core models in Citroen's model line-up. Apart from a new Berlingo van due next autumn - which will be a shared product with its Peugeot and Opel cousins - the next major arrival before year end will be a larger crossover, the C5 Aircross, which has already gone on sale in China. A hybrid version of that car is expected in 2019/2020 while we can expect Citroen's first all-electric offering also by 2020. Air New Zealand crew handing over All Blacks jerseys to Aer Lingus crew after Ireland's loss to New Zealand in 2016. The worlds best airline for 2018 has been announced and the winner is no stranger to the accolade, picking up the top gong for the fifth time in a row. Air New Zealand is the recipient of the number one placing by AirlineRatings.com in its annual assessment of the world's carriers, ranking ahead of its antipodean rivals Qantas and Singapore Airlines. Virgin Australia came fourth ahead of Virgin Atlantic in fifth, while Etihad, All Nippon Airways (ANA), Korean Air, Cathay Pacific and Japan Airlines completed the top 10. The world's best airlines according to AirlineRatings.com: Air New Zealand Qantas Singapore Airlines Virgin Australia Virgin Atlantic Etihad Airways All Nippon Airways Korean Air Cathay Pacific Japan Airlines AirlineRatings.com is an Australia-based safety and product rating website that rates the safety and in flight product of over 435 airlines. Whether number one or number 10, these airlines are the best of the best the elite in aviation, the judging team said. Expand Close Air New Zealand. Photo: Air New Zealand / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Air New Zealand. Photo: Air New Zealand AirlineRatings.com uses 13 criteria to create its rankings, examining the safety record of carriers (airlines must have a seven-star safety rating) as well as taking into account innovations in passenger comfort, passenger reviews, fleet age and environmental credentials. It says the judging team places particular significance on the quality of premium economy seats on long-haul aircraft, which it says are without a doubt the best value proposition for the passenger and airline, and also checks that business class has flat beds. We are looking for leadership and airlines that innovate to make a real difference to the passenger experience, particularly in economy class, the team said. It said that though Air New Zealand topped the rankings for the fifth consecutive year, Qantas and Singapore Airline, both rolling out new aircraft in the form of Boeing 787s and Airbus A350s, are catching up. Of Air New Zealand, AirlineRatings.com said: Air New Zealand is being honored for the fifth consecutive year for its continued record-breaking financial performance, in-flight innovations, environmental leadership, young fleet and motivation of its staff. These factors have stamped the airline as an industry trendsetter. Air New Zealand came out number one - or equal first - in all of our audit criteria, which is an exceptional performance. Europes only entry to the top 10 was Virgin Atlantic, which was praised for its in-flight product and service. The top 10 of AirlineRatings differs from that of Skytrax, which is reponsible for the annual World Airline Awards. It rates Qatar Airways as the world's top carrier, ahead of Singapore Airlines and ANA. The world's Top 10 airlines, according to Skytrax: Qatar Airways Singapore Airlines All Nippon Airways Emirates Cathay Pacific EVA Air Lufthansa Etihad Airways Hainan Airlines Garuda Indonesia What are the worlds worst airlines? Expand Close A Qantas A380 flies over Sydney, Australia / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp A Qantas A380 flies over Sydney, Australia According to AirlineRatings, in a report last year, there are 10 airlines it deems to have just one star out of a possible seven when it comes to safety standards. Batik Air Bluewing Airlines Citilink Kal-Star aviation Lion air Sriwijaya Air TransNusa Trigana Air Service Wings Air Xpress Air What are the worlds safest? Earlier this year, AirlineRatings published a list of its 20 safest carriers, with 19 at equal pegging, but Qantas deemed out in front. The world's safest airline, according to AirlineRatings.com: Qantas The 19 other safest airlines (in alphabetical order): Air New Zealand Alaska Airlines All Nippon Airways British Airways Cathay Pacific Delta Air Lines Etihad Airways EVA Air Finnair Hawaiian Airlines Japan Airlines KLM Lufthansa Scandinavian Singapore Airlines Swiss United Airlines Virgin Atlantic Virgin Australia AirlineRatings.com also handed out a number of specialist awards for 2018, with the winners as follows. Best first class - Singapore Airlines Best business class - Virgin Australia Best premium economy - Air New Zealand Best economy - Korean Air Best cabin crew - Singapore Airlines Best catering - Qantas Best lounges - Qantas Best in-flight entertainment - Emirates Regional airline of the year - Aegean Airlines Most improved - Tiankin Airlines Ultra low-cost airline of the year - VietJetAir.com Best long haul - Etihad (Middle East/Africa), Korean Air (Asia/Pacific), Virgin Atlantic (Europe), Air Canada (Americas) Best low-cost - Westjet (Americas), Scoot (Asia/Pacific), Norwegian (Europe) Read more: Read More Telegraph Media Group Limited [2022] It is a curious fact of life that frequently it is the people with the most ridiculous ideas who are most certain of them. As the capital city was paralysed yesterday because of a pointless and utterly preventable strike, miles of cars were glued bumper-to-bumper as their drivers fumed. All day long on the radio, as workers clocked in late for work and patients missed hospital appointments due to the rail strike, unions and management played Punch and Judy blame games. But it was the public that got clubbed about the head. Irish Rail staff tried to deflect responsibility for the misery unleashed across the country by claiming that the company's CEO was "ramping up" the current pay row. With the prospect of industrial war and five days of stoppages in a company mired in debt, chief executive David Franks was merely stating the obvious. We know that sooner or later there will have to be re-engagement. After making a wrong turn in industrial relations, sometimes one step backwards can actually be a step in the right direction. There are mechanisms for resolving disputes and they must be used before further damage is done. The inertia and shredding of the nerves of commuters as the country's transport system becomes a travesty has gone on too long. But who is stepping up to take charge of the three-ringed circus? Transport Minister Shane Ross has important business with Dear Leader in North Korea, but what about Dear Leo? Did Mr Varadkar not pledge to introduce legislation banning public sector workers from striking in essential services if he was elected Taoiseach? He specifically mentioned transport services. Until Mr Ross can keep his appointment with 'Little Rocket Man', are we - as the song asks - "gonna be a long, long time" before there is any resolution in this stand-off? It surely falls to Mr Varadkar to undertake that the public are not doomed to be left indefinitely, just like the rocket man, "burning out its fuse all alone". A sensible approach to law flouted all too often I hear their screams, I see them die again and again. Geraldine Clancy and her daughter Louise Ann after they were killed just before Christmas three years ago. Their car was pushed into a flooded dyke and they drowned following a collision near their home in Kilworth, Co Cork. The car that crashed into them was driven by an unaccompanied learner driver. The words of the Clancy family after the court case where the learner driver was convicted were harrowing. The thought of my mother and sister screaming for their lives, knowing that they were going to drown tortures me every night. The nightmares leave me physically exhausted, Declan Clancy recalled as he stood with his father, Noel, and sister, Fiona. No family should have to go through the trauma the Clancy family have endured. Everyone knows learner drivers are breaking the law by driving unaccompanied. The law is flouted. The campaigning by the Clancy family has inspired a change in the law for driving unaccompanied. The focus will be switched back to the owner of the car. Now, Transport Minister Shane Ross is bringing forward legislation which will result in car owners who allow learner drivers to use their vehicles unaccompanied facing six months in prison and a 2,000 fine. The new law will also give gardai formal powers to impound vehicles on the spot if the learner driver is unaccompanied. This sensible measure deserves Oireachtas support. I can hear grown men howling - "Get your hands off my Thomas!" Too late chaps, Thomas the Tank Engine is going to be joined by a bunch of new girly machines. This is the brave new world of gender balance, so two new female engines are set to join Emily - the only girl previously allowed into the Tidmouth Sheds boys' club. It shouldn't be so hard to get used to though, many men already refer to their cars as 'she'. While we're at it let's have a discussion about the 'Mr Men' books. For 10 years there were no 'Miss' books. When they did arrive in 1981 they were called 'Little Miss'. In the interests of positive discrimination for girls I would like to request that, for the next 20 years, the male-gendered books are given the diminutive title of 'Little Mr Men', while the girls can identify with a female gendered series called 'Ms Woman'. Here are some examples: Little Mr Greedy, Little Mr Nonsense and Little Mr Nosey. Ms Neat, Ms Giggles and Ms Splendid. Alison Hackett Dun Laoghaire, Co Dublin Safe havens under attack There was a time when a church was a place of safety or refuge, either by law or by convention, and at times people could 'hide' in a church building. They considered themselves safe because no one would commit violence in a 'holy' place. This idea of a safe haven has come under attack both literally, in Texas, and metaphorically around the world. It's not just a matter of who can have guns and certainly not the horrifying suggestion of bringing more guns for more safety. It's a worldwide issue of many people needing a place of safety and a right to be safe. We have a long way to go until we really feel safe. Dennis Fitzgerald Melbourne, Australia Fathers need to teach 'conduct' There has been a very legitimate angry reaction to the recent 'Weinstein'-type allegations, but we should be careful we don't throw the baby out with the bath water. In other words, not all men are sexual predators. Men need to self regulate and step in when others cross the line. In particular, fathers need to teach 'gentleman codes of conduct' to their young sons long before they become adults. Although most of us agree, we need more than a "cop yourself on" remark, to curtail misbehaviour. Damien Carroll Kingswood, Dublin 24 It's all hot air without the evidence According to the director general of the Environmental Protection Agency (Irish Independent, November 7) 1,500 "premature deaths" in Ireland in 2014 were "directly attributable to air pollution". Surely such a statement, presented as fact, requires supporting evidence. D H Michael Ballina, Co Mayo No shame for me or my granny I am an active campaigner for reproductive rights in Galway and I am writing to discuss why I personally am fighting for the right to free, safe, and legal abortion in Ireland. I am a PhD candidate. I spend the majority of my days reading contemporary records relating to the long history of control and subjugation women and children have faced under the Irish State. Women with no options fled to England after having been forced to give up their babies or while trying to conceal their pregnancies. English bishops wrote back to Catholic Primate of Ireland John McQuaid begging "please deal with your problem at home!" We would like to think we have moved past this time, but women every day are still taking flights and ferries to access their human rights and receive what is considered elsewhere basic healthcare. Every day that I am studying these records and hearing these stories, I get angrier, but I am reminded of Phil Scraton's lecture on his Hillsborough research and fight for justice where he told us not to separate academia and activism and not to lose our rage in the process. I am an American and a dual citizen of both countries. I am the granddaughter of a Galway woman. When I was manning a pro-choice stall months back a woman shouted at me "your granny would be ashamed!" My granny would not be ashamed, were she alive today. She would be proud because she remembered the state of things for women in Ireland that she left behind when she moved to the United States. Like me, she loved Ireland but wanted to see a better future for those who came after. I hope that you will take the time to consider the deeply negative ramifications that this amendment has and how your vote for repeal will help us move forward as a society. Jamie Ellen Address with editor Why so bitter about cup levy? Once again Ireland leads the way! Smoking bans, plastic bag levy, and now a disposable coffee cup levy. I would welcome such an initiative here in Belfast; I particularly love the suggestion of a 'fast track' coffee queue! I fear, however, your correspondent Paul Melia, in favouring an outright ban on disposable cups, has not thought this through. For those of us who travel, would the ban apply in airports? Would I have to forgo my morning caffeine fix if I forget my re-usable cup? Would one coffee chain refuse to serve take away coffee in a mug from a rival establishment? No, sir, just this once your minister has made the right call. An outright ban would simply lead to a black market in disposable cups. It doesn't bear thinking about. Gareth James Belfast Instead of just bringing your own coffee cup with you, why not bring the kettle as well and make your own? John Williams Clonmel, Co Tipperary Farmers' carbon tax pass unfair It is about time the question of harmful emissions arising from agriculture was seriously addressed. Farmers are the first link in the food chain, but are the only group in the chain exempt from carbon tax. The giant milk processing plants are enormous energy users - but pay carbon tax. So do meat processing plants. The transport companies that bring milk and animals to the processing plant pay carbon tax, as do the companies delivering the finished products to supermarkets. Supermarkets pay tax on their energy usage for heating, lighting and refrigeration. Lastly, the customer pays carbon tax on the fuel used in journeys to and from the supermarket and on the energy used to cook the food at home. So why should farmers be the only link in the food chain exempt? Anthony O'Leary Portmarnock, Co Dublin Subscribe to The Ready Business show, in association with Vodafone via iTunes or SoundCloud. On this week's show, Brian Purcell meets the man who, because he failed to get his dream job at Google, went from delivering pizzas at night to pay the rent, to doing it himself by setting up his own digital agency. I never wanted a job more in my life, says Alan Coleman. I was devastated when I didnt get it and took it quite hard but then I said, feck it, Ill do it myself. I was delivering pizzas at night to pay the rent and it just went from there. Wolfgang Digital has now grown to a staff of 40+ and its founder and MD, Alan Coleman reveals the secret to his success and explains how one door slamming shut on you can open up a world of unforeseen opportunities. Plus, he has tips and advice to help your business become a success online. The Ready Business show, in association with Vodafone , is available via iTunes , SoundCloud and Stitcher or subscribe to the RSS feed of the Ready Business Podcast using your favourite podcatcher. You can check out the full Ready Business Podcast series here . Sponsored by: Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge attends the Coach Core graduation ceremony for more than 150 Coach Core apprentices at The London Stadium on October 18, 2017 in London, England. (Photo by Chris Jackson/Getty Images) Prince William, Duke of Cambridge and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge attend the Coach Core graduation ceremony for more than 150 Coach Core apprentices at The London Stadium on October 18, 2017 in London, England. (Photo by Chris Jackson/Getty Images) The Duchess of Cambridge attends the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families (AFNCCF) gala dinner at Kensington Palace, London The Duchess of Cambridge speaks to Peter Fonagy, CEO of the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families (AFNCCF) during the gala dinner at Kensington Palace, London Augstein/PA Wire The Duchess of Cambridge arrives for the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families (AFNCCF) gala dinner at Kensington Palace, London Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge speaks to Peter Fonagy at the 2017 Gala Dinner for The Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families (AFNCCF) at Kensington Palace on November 7, 2017 in London, England. (Photo by Frank Augstein - WPA Pool/Getty Images) The Duchess of Cambridge attends the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families (AFNCCF) gala dinner at Kensington Palace, London The Duchess of Cambridge arrives for the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families (AFNCCF) gala dinner at Kensington Palace, London If there's one thing fashion rule Kate Middleton abides by, it's if it ain't broke, don't fix it. The Duchess of Cambridge is expecting her third child with husband Prince William (both 35) and much like her day-to-day appearances, her maternity style is scrutinised and analysed by royal watchers. On Tuesday night, the mother-of-two opted for a familiar design, a black lace gown by Diane von Furstenberg, a piece she originally wore while expecting Princess Charlotte in 2014. Expand Close Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge speaks to Peter Fonagy at the 2017 Gala Dinner for The Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families (AFNCCF) at Kensington Palace on November 7, 2017 in London, England. (Photo by Frank Augstein - WPA Pool/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge speaks to Peter Fonagy at the 2017 Gala Dinner for The Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families (AFNCCF) at Kensington Palace on November 7, 2017 in London, England. (Photo by Frank Augstein - WPA Pool/Getty Images) While she has been selective about public appearances during her pregnancy as she was experience hyperemesis gravidarum - a severe form of morning sickness - during her first trimester, but she didn't have far to travel as last night's events for mental health charity Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families (AFNCCF) held at Kensington Palace's Orangery. Kate was guest of honour for the occasion as she is patron for the organisation, which she also supports via her Heads Together charity with William and brother-in-law Prince Harry. Guests thanked the royals for their support - Terell Llewellyn (11) said Kate told him "well done" for returning to mainstream school after receiving help from the charity, while his father praised the importance of the assistance they received. "It makes a difference that the Duchess of Cambridge has taken an interest in this. It's brilliant. There's a lot of children in London who could do with this kind of help," his father Wayne Llewellyn told the Press Association. It has been announced that Kate will give birth in April. And it appears she's back to her best, with a source telling E! News, "she has such a rotten time during these early month. But she's out of the woods now and doing well." Expand Close The Duchess of Cambridge attends the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families (AFNCCF) gala dinner at Kensington Palace, London / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp The Duchess of Cambridge attends the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families (AFNCCF) gala dinner at Kensington Palace, London Chief executive of the Anna Freud Centre said the Duchess is "very interested in maternal mental health". "One of the things that we are interested in is intervening as early as possible in children's lives to improve their chances of good mental health throughout life," he said. "She's particularly concerned that mothers' mental health plays a major role in this and that we are able to support mothers to support their children." When asked why she is such an ardent supporter of mental health issues, she explained earlier this year: "As parents, we all want our children to have the best possible start in life." A former US news anchor has accused Kevin Spacey of sexually assaulting her teenage son. Heather Unruh told reporters the actor had bought her son drink after drink at a restaurant in Massachusetts in July 2016 before allegedly sticking his hand down the 18-year-olds pants and grabbing his genitals. It is the latest accusation made against Spacey, who is being investigated by police in the UK over an alleged sexual assault in Lambeth in 2008. Ms Unruh told reporters: To Kevin Spacey, I want to say this: Shame on you for what you did to my son. Nothing could have prepared my son for how that sexual assault would make him feel as a man. Expand Close Baby Driver European Premiere London / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Baby Driver European Premiere London She said her son had not reported the alleged assault at the time because he was embarrassed. He filed a report with police last week, she added. Nantucket police chief Bill Pittman told the Associated Press that Massachusetts law does not allow them to confirm or deny a report of sexual assault. Netflix has cut ties with the House Of Cards star and suspended the shows sixth season indefinitely since allegations first emerged. Video of the Day They also canned a Gore Vidal biopic which had Spacey starring as the author. A lawyer for Spacey has been contacted for comment. Aoibhin Garrihy was one of the judges of the Best Dressed Lady competition at the Galway Races. Picture: Tony Gavin Aoibhin Garrihy at the launch of the Urban Decay Troublemaker mascara at St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin. Picture: Brian McEvoy Aoibhin Garrihy at the World Premiere of Angela's Ashes the Musical at the Bord Gais Theatre, Dublin. Picture: Brian McEvoy John Burke and Aoibhin Garrihy at the 2015 People of the Year Awards organised by Rehab and held in RTE. Picture: Robbie Reynolds Aoibhin Garrihy is enjoying married life so much that she feels "stressed" if she has to spend too much time away from husband John Burke. The former Fair City actress married the hotelier in Co Clare last year and after a tough period apart while he was climbing Mount Everest, the pair are glad to finally be together again. Expand Close Aoibhin Garrihy and John Burke at the #3Disco area at Electric Picnic. PictureBrian McEvoy / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Aoibhin Garrihy and John Burke at the #3Disco area at Electric Picnic. PictureBrian McEvoy "I think I get stressed if I doesn't see him for a couple of weeks because we always keep the lines of communication open," she said. "It certainly hasn't been a difficult year at all and if every year is like this we are in for a real adventure." Aoibhin, from Castleknock, has since moved down to Clare since she and John wed and she travels to the capital for work. "I was in denial after making the decision to get on the Naas Road and head for the West three years ago. Expand Close Aoibhin Garrihy welcomes home husband John Burke. Picture: Arthur Ellis / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Aoibhin Garrihy welcomes home husband John Burke. Picture: Arthur Ellis "For a while, I thought it didn't make career sense because the work was in the Pale or across the pond in London or New York. "Sometimes you need to find balance and be honest and truthful with yourself. I am happier and I feel such a sense of ease in Clare and self-care is really important," she said. Finding fame as Neasa on Fair City, Aoibhin has not ruled out a return to the soap in the future, despite the "all-consuming" nature of the show. "Neasa DIllon is alive, she is not dead, so that's good and I am open to whatever lands in my lap," she told RSVP magazine. Video of the Day "Fair City is quite time consuming, that's the only thing I will say, and you are married to your role. "It works so fast and you have to be on-call nearly all of the time. But who knows what will happen down the line?" US President Donald Trump (R) prepares to addresse US soldiers as his wife Melania looks on upon arriving at US Yokota Air Base in Tokyo on November 5, 2017 US President Donald Trump and his wife first lady Melania Trump prepare to depart from the White House on Marine One on November 3, 2017 in Washington, DC. President Trump is embarking on a five country, 11 day trip throughout Asia. (Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images) US first lady Melania Trump might only be halfway through an 11-day trip to Asia with her husband, president Donald Trump, but her tour de designer ensembles is already rather impressive. With a well documented taste for the finer things in fashion, she is adopting a slightly more subdued style while overseas, which means she isn't wearing any 50k coats, but the numbers still add up. Arriving in Tokyo, Japan, Melania was her version of dressed down in a leaf print sundress by Borgo De Nor (900) and nude ballet flats by Christian Louboutin (450). Expand Close President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump emerge from their limousine and greeted the press before departing for a 10 day Asia trip from Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Honolulu on Saturday, Nov. 4, 2017 / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump emerge from their limousine and greeted the press before departing for a 10 day Asia trip from Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Honolulu on Saturday, Nov. 4, 2017 Upon arrival in Tokyo, Japan, she wraps up in a cardigan coat by Fendi and a pair of nude suede heels by Manolo Blahnik (515). Expand Close US President Donald Trump (R) and his wife Melania wave as they arrive at Yokota Air Base at Fussa in Tokyo on November 5, 2017 / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp US President Donald Trump (R) and his wife Melania wave as they arrive at Yokota Air Base at Fussa in Tokyo on November 5, 2017 Later in the evening, she wrapped up in a black coat dress by Herve Pierre, the French designer who made her inauguration gown and a pair of Manolo Blahnik heels, 500. Expand Close U.S. President Donald Trump and his wife Melania Trump are welcomed by Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his wife Akie Abe with a dinner at Ginza Ukai Tei in Tokyo, Japan November 5, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp U.S. President Donald Trump and his wife Melania Trump are welcomed by Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his wife Akie Abe with a dinner at Ginza Ukai Tei in Tokyo, Japan November 5, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst For a state dinner at Akasaka Palace in Tokyo, Japan, she chose a dramatic red Valentino dress for approximately 4,225. Expand Close U.S. first lady Melania Trump and President Donald Trump arrive for an official dinner thrown in their honor by Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at Akasaka Palace in Tokyo, Japan November 6, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp U.S. first lady Melania Trump and President Donald Trump arrive for an official dinner thrown in their honor by Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at Akasaka Palace in Tokyo, Japan November 6, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst On her arrival to Tokyo's Imperial Palace, where she is greeted by Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko, she sticks to a modest Dior dress (3,000) with pleated skirt and wide sleeves and a pair of velvet cerulean Manolo Blahnik heels, 500. Video of the Day Expand Close U.S. President Donald Trump, center left, and First Lady Melania Trump, left, are welcomed by Emperor Akihito, second from right, Empress Michiko, right, upon their arrival at the Imperial Palace Monday, Nov. 6, 2017 in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko, Pool) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp U.S. President Donald Trump, center left, and First Lady Melania Trump, left, are welcomed by Emperor Akihito, second from right, Empress Michiko, right, upon their arrival at the Imperial Palace Monday, Nov. 6, 2017 in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko, Pool) As she touched down in Seoul, South Korea, she wore a dramatic Delpozo coat specially designed and ordered by US department store Bergdorf Goodman for 3,535; paired with electric blue Christian Louboutin pumps (545). Expand Close U.S. First Lady Melania Trump during a welcoming ceremony held at the presidential Blue House on November 7, 2017 in Seoul, South Korea. Trump is in South Korea as a part of his Asian tour. (Photo by Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp U.S. First Lady Melania Trump during a welcoming ceremony held at the presidential Blue House on November 7, 2017 in Seoul, South Korea. Trump is in South Korea as a part of his Asian tour. (Photo by Chung Sung-Jun/Getty Images) At a state dinner with South Korea's President Moon Jae-In at the presidential Blue House in Seoul, she wears a semi-sheer lace gown with embellishment. Expand Close US President Donald Trump (C) toasts South Korea's President Moon Jae-In (R) near US First Lady Melania Trump during a state dinner at the presidential Blue House in Seoul on November 7, 2017 / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp US President Donald Trump (C) toasts South Korea's President Moon Jae-In (R) near US First Lady Melania Trump during a state dinner at the presidential Blue House in Seoul on November 7, 2017 For all the looks of her trip so far, see our gallery below: U.S. President Donald Trump, first lady Melania Trump and their son Barron Trump arrive at the White House June 11, 2017 in Washington, DC. According to reports, Melania and Barron will soon be moving from Trump Tower in New York City to the White House. (Photo by Chris Kleponis-Pool/Getty Images) U.S. President Donald Trump, first lady Melania Trump and their son Barron Trump arrive at the White House June 11, 2017 in Washington, DC. According to reports, Melania and Barron will soon be moving from Trump Tower in New York City to the White House. (Photo by Chris Kleponis-Pool/Getty Images) U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump arrive at the White House June 11, 2017 in Washington, DC. According to reports, Melania and Barron will soon be moving from Trump Tower in New York City to the White House. (Photo by Chris Kleponis-Pool/Getty Images) U.S. President Donald Trump, first lady Melania Trump and their son Barron Trump arrive at the White House June 11, 2017 in Washington, DC. According to reports, Melania and Barron will soon be moving from Trump Tower in New York City to the White House. (Photo by Chris Kleponis-Pool/Getty Images) U.S. President Donald Trump, first lady Melania Trump and their son Barron Trump arrive at the White House June 11, 2017 in Washington, DC. According to reports, Melania and Barron will soon be moving from Trump Tower in New York City to the White House. (Photo by Chris Kleponis-Pool/Getty Images) U.S. President Donald Trump with First Lady Melania Trump and their son Barron arrive at Joint Base Andrews outside Washington, U.S., after a weekend at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey, U.S., June 11, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas U.S. President Donald Trump, first lady Melania Trump and their son Barron Trump arrive at the White House June 11, 2017 in Washington, DC. According to reports, Melania and Barron will soon be moving from Trump Tower in New York City to the White House. (Photo by Chris Kleponis-Pool/Getty Images) U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump arrive at the White House June 11, 2017 in Washington, DC. According to reports, Melania and Barron will soon be moving from Trump Tower in New York City to the White House. (Photo by Chris Kleponis-Pool/Getty Images) You can take the woman out of New York... US First Lady Melania Trump has officially moved into the White House, but if her first outfit as a resident is anything to go by, geography hasn't changed her reluctance to accept a new life separate from her gilded existence in New York City. The 47-year-old former model arrived on the South Lawn of her new home with husband, US President Donald Trump and their 11-year-old son Barron with the ultimate status symbol in tow - an Hermes Birkin bag, costing an estimated 12,000. She completed her look with a pair of culottes, which are fast becoming her summer staple, a sleeveless white shell top and Christian Louboutin heels. Last month, Melania opted for a $51,000 floral 3D coat by Dolce & Gabbana while at the G7 Summit in Sicily. Expand Close U.S. President Donald Trump with First Lady Melania Trump and their son Barron arrive at Joint Base Andrews outside Washington, U.S., after a weekend at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey, U.S., June 11, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp U.S. President Donald Trump with First Lady Melania Trump and their son Barron arrive at Joint Base Andrews outside Washington, U.S., after a weekend at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey, U.S., June 11, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas Her decision not to adjust her elaborate wardrobe since becoming first lady has divided critics and many designers have come forward revealing their refusal to dress her. Designer Tom Ford previously said his refusal to dress Melania is not motivated solely by his differing political beliefs, but also that of the "I was asked to dress [Melania Trump] quite a few years ago and I declined," he explained. "She's not necessarily my image." "The first lady other than the fact that I'm a Democrat and voted for Hillary [Clinton] and am very sad and disappointed that shes not in office even had Hillary won, she shouldn't be wearing my clothes. They're too expensive." Expand Close U.S. President Donald Trump, first lady Melania Trump and their son Barron Trump arrive at the White House June 11, 2017 in Washington, DC. According to reports, Melania and Barron will soon be moving from Trump Tower in New York City to the White House. (Photo by Chris Kleponis-Pool/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp U.S. President Donald Trump, first lady Melania Trump and their son Barron Trump arrive at the White House June 11, 2017 in Washington, DC. According to reports, Melania and Barron will soon be moving from Trump Tower in New York City to the White House. (Photo by Chris Kleponis-Pool/Getty Images) Paris Jackson poses at the Myer Marquee on Emirates Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Graham Denholm/Getty Images for the VRC) Robyn Lawley poses at the Kennedy Marquee on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Jodi Gordon attends the MYER Marquee on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Lleyton Hewitt and Bec Hewitt arrive at the Kennedy Marquee on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Racegoers enjoy the atmosphere during Melbourne Cup Day at Royal Randwick Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Sydney, Australia. (Photo by Jason McCawley/Getty Images for The ATC) Racegoers enjoy the atmosphere during Melbourne Cup Day at Royal Randwick Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Sydney, Australia. (Photo by Jason McCawley/Getty Images for The ATC) Racegoers enjoy the atmosphere during Melbourne Cup Day at Royal Randwick Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Sydney, Australia. (Photo by Jason McCawley/Getty Images for The ATC) Racegoers enjoy the atmosphere during Melbourne Cup Day at Royal Randwick Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Sydney, Australia. (Photo by Jason McCawley/Getty Images for The ATC) Pia Miller and boyfriend Tyson Mullane attend the G.H. Mumm Marquee on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Brittany Boys pose at the Kennedy Marquee on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Elyse Knowles and Brooke Meredith pose at the Kennedy Marquee on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) A racegoer enjoys the atmosphere on Emirates Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Matt King/Getty Images for the VRC) Jennifer Hawkins attends the MYER Marquee on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Rachel Finch attends the MYER Marquee on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Jennifer Hawkins attends the MYER Marquee on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Edwina Bartholomew poses on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Robyn Lawley and James Roberts pose at the Kennedy Marquee on Derby Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 4, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Georgia Love poses on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Nadia Bartel poses at the Kennedy Marquee on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Robyn Lawley poses at the Kennedy Marquee on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Paris Jackson poses at the Myer Marquee on Emirates Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Graham Denholm/Getty Images for the VRC) Paris Jackson poses at the Myer Marquee on Emirates Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Graham Denholm/Getty Images for the VRC) Paris Jackson poses at the Myer Marquee on Emirates Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Graham Denholm/Getty Images for the VRC) Paris Jackson poses at the Myer Marquee on Emirates Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Graham Denholm/Getty Images for the VRC) Racing style differs around the world. While wide brim hats and high heels seem par for the course no matter what part of th world you're in, Australians seem to be one step ahead when it comes to dressing for the occasion. They are responsible for the move from pillbox hats to edgy headbands and we're already taking notes for next year. For Tuesday's Melbourne Gold Cup at Flemington Racecourse on Tuesday, the glitterti donned their brightest and tightest, with a few familiar faces sprinkled in between. Expand Close Paris Jackson poses at the Myer Marquee on Emirates Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Graham Denholm/Getty Images for the VRC) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Paris Jackson poses at the Myer Marquee on Emirates Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Graham Denholm/Getty Images for the VRC) Like everywhere else in the world, it's big business for brands who want to have the right people photographed in their tent. Michael Jackson's daughter Paris (19) was a surprise addition to the crowd, enjoying the atmosphere at the Myer Marquee, doing it her own way in a boho dress by Alex Perry with statement starburst gold earrings. As a rising Hollywood 'it' girl, she's no stranger to fabulous parties with equally fabulous people, but said she wasn't prepared for the effort that comes with the races, expecting a Dodgers-stadium-style jeans and t-shirt attire from guests. "Coming from the background '[I do] - my mother breeds horses and I've ridden before - Im used to cowboy hats and jeans, stirrups you ride bareback. So this is a completely new world for me and its exciting that I get to be a part of it but its also really awesome getting to know the Australian culture," she told Vogue Australia. Expand Close Robyn Lawley poses at the Kennedy Marquee on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Robyn Lawley poses at the Kennedy Marquee on Melbourne Cup Day at Flemington Racecourse on November 7, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images) Sports Illustrated Swimsuit model Robyn Lawley, who was the first plus-size model (yes, she's considered plus-size in the fashion industry) to feature in the publication, brought her A-game this week with two different looks: a figure-hugging plunging cranberry and black dress and turban-style headpiece by Kerrie Stanley, while earlier this week, she opted for all-black, including an impressive hat and clutch by Australian designer Olga Berg, whose designs are ever growing in popularity with Irish shoppers (and are available at Arnotts). A host of other socialites and actresses who are household names Down Under inspired us for next summer, when we pray the sun comes out at Ballybrit and beyond. For all the must-see looks from the races, see our gallery below: Asylum seekers protest against the possible closure of their detention centre on Manus Island, Papua New Guinea (AP) More than 500 asylum seekers remain in a decommissioned Australian immigration camp in Papua New Guinea, despite a court ruling that authorities no longer need to supply power, food and water. The camp inside a Manus Island navy base was declared closed on October 31, based on the Papua New Guinea Supreme Court's ruling last year that Australia's policy of housing asylum seekers there was unconstitutional. However, the men who have stayed at the male-only camp on Lombrun Navy Base fear for their safety in the alternative shelters available in the nearby town of Lorengau because of threats from local residents. Papua New Guinea police chief superintendent Dominic Kakas said that by Wednesday, 38 asylum seekers had left the camp since the Supreme Court rejected an application to restore basic services on human rights grounds. That meant 54 asylum seekers of the 606 in the camp had left since the camp officially closed in October, Mr Kakas said. He added that authorities are hoping that in the next couple of days or so, the remainder will leave. Australian immigration and border protection minister Peter Dutton rejected security concerns about the Lorengau premises, a 30-minute drive from the naval base. For four years, Australia has paid Papua New Guinea, its nearest neighbour, and the tiny Pacific island nation of Nauru to house asylum seekers who attempt to reach the Australian coast by boat. They include Rohingya Muslims from Burma, Afghans, Iranians, Sri Lankans and other nationalities. Australia has recognised that many of the asylum seekers are refugees who cannot return to their homelands, but it refuses to resettle anyone who tried to reach the country by boat in a policy it credits with dissuading such dangerous ocean crossings. Some whose refugee claims were denied have been forcibly sent home. The United States has resettled 54 of them in recent weeks and is considering taking almost 1,200 more. AP When Twitter doubled its character limit for a select group of users in September, there were some raised eyebrows at the fact that Donald Trump didnt appear to be among them. But now the site has rolled 280-character tweets out across the board, the US president, possibly the worlds most prominent Twitter user, finally has the opportunity to be more expansive with his missives. So how did he use this new facility? Here is his first ever 280-character (well, 215-character to be precise) tweet: 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 Trump has long been noted for his inflammatory output on Twitter, touching on subjects including North Korea, the fake news media and myriad rows with celebrities. But anyone hoping for something outrageous or controversial from his first long tweet or even a reference to the new character count will have been disappointed. The tweet was a relatively bland update on the itinerary of his ongoing tour of Asia. 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 Interestingly, the expanded character count does not apply for those writing in Japanese, Chinese or Korean languages which already allow more to be said in fewer characters so Trumps hosts will not get the benefit of the new feature. The president followed up with a second longer tweet, referencing Republican Ed Gillespies defeat in the Virginia gubernatorial election. 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 Trump had previously urged Republicans to vote for Gillespie, who surprised some analysts with the degree to which he took on the presidents conservative agenda. If nothing else, the new character limit has allowed Trump to offer his own more detailed counter-analysis. But the world will continue to await Trumps first 280-character tweet about Little Rocket Man Kim Jong-un with interest. A Virginia politician has made US history by becoming the first openly transgender person to be elected to any state legislature in the country. Danica Roem beat Republican Bob Marshall, whod represented northern Virginia in the House of Delegates for 26 years, and this year proposed a Bill that would have have restricted which toilets Roem could use. Who is she? 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 The 33-year-old is a Democrat and former local news reporter who also sings in a metal band in her spare time. During the campaign Roem had to deal with being repeatedly misgendered by the notoriously conservative Marshall, who once described himself as chief homophobe, but also spoke openly about her gender. Roem focused on jobs, schools and, most prominently, northern Virginias traffic congestion, in one of this years most high-profile US elections. The northern Virginia resident has been vocal against Donald Trump, but was asked to run before he became president. 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 When Trump tried and failed to ban transgender people from the military, she said: It is nothing short of hypocrisy for someone unfit to serve honourably in the presidency to tell honourable, hard-working, patriotic Americans who answered their countrys call to service that they are unfit to serve because of who they are. The message that I can succeed because of my gender, not despite it, because of who I am without being afraid of who I am is a human message, Roem told Cosmopolitan in September. Its something that even if you are cisgender, but you have some reason that youve been singled out in your life you can look at me and say If she can do this, so can I. What has the reaction been like? Expand Close Danica Roem celebrates her win / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Danica Roem celebrates her win The mood on social media has been celebratory. 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 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 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 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 People also used Roems victory to mention Althea Garrison, a transgender person who won a seat in Bostons legislature in 1992 before being subsequently outed by a Conservative newspaper. 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 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 Roem will take her seat in January but she wasnt the only transgender person to be elected on Tuesday. Tyler Titus, who is openly transgender, won a seat on a western Pennsylvania school board, The Erie Times-News reported. 2017 will be remembered as the year of the trans candidate and Danicas heroic run for office the centrepiece of that national movement, Aisha Moodie-Mills, president and chief executive of Victory Fund, said in a statement. As the International Development Secretary flew back to Britain under orders from the Government, thousands were watching her flight online. Priti Patel cut short an official visit to Africa to return to Downing Street on Prime Minister Theresa Mays orders after failing to disclose a series of 12 meetings with senior Israeli figures during a family holiday in the country in August. Expand Close Priti Patel Israeli holiday / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Priti Patel Israeli holiday The story is still developing, including a report from the Israeli Haaretz newspaper that, during her stay in the country, she visited an Israeli military field hospital in the occupied Golan Heights. Britain does not recognise Israeli control of the area. Downing Street has denied a report in the Jewish Chronicle that Patel told May in the run-up to the UN General Assembly in September that her meetings in Israel had included talks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. And so a plane flying from Nairobi to London Heathrow was suddenly receiving a lot of attention. According to the Flight Radar website, more than 22,000 people were tracking flight KQA100, which Patel was reported to be on. Usually flights are tracked by zero to 200 people. 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 The excitement over the eight-and-a-half-hour flight from Nairobi to London on a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner was overflowing on Twitter as people compared it to other scenarios. 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 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 Some felt the hysteria over Patels flight was a bit like OJ Simpson running from police in his Bronco in 1994. 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 Others thought Patel will be in for a shock of similar proportions to Justine Sacco, a communications worker who posted a bad-taste joke on Twitter before boarding a flight to South Africa in 2013, only to discover she had gone horribly viral while in the air. 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 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 Much of the speculation was around what Patels fate may be once the plane lands. 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 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 Sales of nuclear shelters and radiation-blocking air purifiers have surged in Japan in recent weeks as North Korea has pressed ahead with missile tests in defiance of U.N. sanctions. A small company that specializes in building nuclear shelters, generally under people's houses, has received eight orders in April alone compared with six orders during a typical year. The company, Oribe Seiki Seisakusho, based in Kobe, western Japan, also has sold out of 50 Swiss-made air purifiers, which are said to keep out radiation and poisonous gas, and is trying to get more, said Nobuko Oribe, the company's director. A purifier designed for six people sells for 620,000 yen ($5,630) and one designed for 13 people and usually installed in a family-use shelter costs 1.7 million yen ($15,440). Concerns about a possible gas attack have grown in Japan after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told a parliament session this month that North Korea may have the capacity to deliver missiles equipped with sarin nerve gas. "It takes time and money to build a shelter. But all we hear these days, in this tense atmosphere, is that they want one now," Oribe said. "They ask us to come right away and give them an estimate." Expand Close Kim Jong-un has ramped up tension with the US. Photo: Reuters / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Kim Jong-un has ramped up tension with the US. Photo: Reuters Another small company, Earth Shift, based in Shizuoka prefecture, has seen a tenfold increase in inquiries and quotes for its underground shelters, Akira Shiga, a sales manager at the company said. The inquiries began gradually increasing in February and have come from all over Japan, he said. North Korean missiles have fired with increasing frequency. Last month, three fell into waters within Japan's exclusive economic zone, some 300-350 kilometers off the coast of northern Akita prefecture. The Japanese government on Friday urged local governments to hold evacuation drills in case of a possible missile attack, heightening a sense of urgency among the public. Read More Some orders for the shelters were placed by owners of small-sized companies for their employees, and others by families, Oribe said. A nuclear shelter for up to 13 people costs about 25 million yen ($227,210) and takes about four months to build, he said. Expand Close 'North Korea's leader, Kim Jong-un, is by any standards a disgraceful individual and his regime is utterly disgusting.' Photo: Getty Images / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp 'North Korea's leader, Kim Jong-un, is by any standards a disgraceful individual and his regime is utterly disgusting.' Photo: Getty Images The shelter his company offers is a reinforced, air-tight basement with an air purifier that can block radiation as well as poisonous gas. The room is designed to withstand a blast even when a Hiroshima-class nuclear bomb exploded just 660 meters away, Oribe said. North Korea said on Sunday it was ready to sink a U.S. aircraft carrier to demonstrate its military might, in the latest sign of rising tension in the region. Read More The United States ordered the USS Carl Vinson carrier strike group to sail to waters off the Korean peninsula in response to mounting concern over the reclusive state's nuclear and missile programmes. In Japan's previous experience with sarin gas in 1995, members of a doomsday cult killed 12 people and made thousands ill in attacks on Tokyo subways ($1 = 110.0300 yen) Banking giants have reportedly warned the US government they could be forced to start moving thousands of jobs out of London within months due to uncertainty over Brexit. A consortium of banks including JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and HSBC warned US commerce secretary Wilbur Ross that they might start moving staff abroad in the near future, the Financial Times said. Senior executives blamed lack of clarity over whether the Government will secure a transition deal to help them navigate the change in financial regulation after the UK leaves the EU. The paper said the banks also outlined their concern that they had received no clear indication of what the final Brexit deal might look like at the closed-door meeting during Mr Rosss visit to London on Friday. Without this clarity, they told Mr Ross they would move chunks of their operations to the US or other EU cities. Possible contingency plans have been debated by banks since before the EU vote, but the discussions have become increasingly urgent, a source told the FT. Catherine McGuinness, policy chair at the Corporation of London, which is the Citys local government, told the FT the fear of a crash-out is rising. She said the next three months could prove the tipping point for many banks for their future operations in London, adding: We really shouldnt understate or underestimate what a critical moment were at for this sector. Some car markers have said the targets are drastic The European Commission has said it wants to cut emissions of carbon dioxide from cars by 30% by 2030, and boost the use of electric vehicles by making them cheaper and easier to charge. The proposal stops short of imposing fixed quotas for emission-free vehicles, and is more modest than goals already set out by some EU members. However, European car makers said the new targets were too drastic. Commission vice president Maros Sefcovic insisted the plan is the most "realistic" compromise between Europe's ambitions to blaze trails on clean energy and the costs that the continent's powerful car manufacturers will have to bear to overhaul workforces and production. Current targets require car makers to achieve the average permitted emission for new models in the European Union of 95 grams of CO2 per kilometre for cars, or 147 grams for light commercial vehicles by 2021. The new proposal foresees a further reduction of 15% by 2025 and 30% by 2030, compared to 2021 levels. Car companies which fail to meet those targets face substantial fines of 95 euro (83) per excess gram of carbon dioxide per car. Car makers that manage to equip at least 30% of their new cars with electric or other low-emission engines by 2030 will be given credits toward their carbon tally. The European Automobile Manufacturers' Association, an industry body, criticised the 2025 target, saying "it does not leave enough time to make the necessary technical and design changes to vehicles, in particular to light commercial vehicles given their longer development and production cycles". The lobby group also said the targeted cut of 30% by 2030 was "overly challenging" and called for a 20% reduction instead, saying that was "achievable at a high, but acceptable, cost". The group's secretary general, Erik Jonnaert, said: "The current proposal is very aggressive when we consider the low and fragmented market penetration of alternatively-powered vehicles across Europe to date." The European executive's plan also includes 800 million euro (704 million) in funding for the expansion and standardisation of electric charging stations Europe-wide. The proposal is part of EU efforts to meet commitments under the Paris climate accord. UN member states are meeting in Germany from November 6-17 to discuss how to implement the 2015 agreement, which called for a sharp fall in carbon emissions to curb global warming. AP UK International Development Secretary Priti Patel has been ordered back to Britain following the disclosure that she held further unauthorised meetings with Israeli politicians during a holiday to the country. Ms Patel - who began a three-day visit to Africa on Tuesday - is flying back to the UK after being summoned by Theresa May to explain herself, sources said. It follows her mea culpa about undisclosed meetings in Israel, including with prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It is understood Ms Patel met Israeli public security minister Gilad Erdan in Parliament on September 7, and foreign ministry official Yuval Rotem in New York on September 18, following the August meetings in Israel. It is understood that Downing Street was told about the New York breakfast with Mr Rotem when Ms Patel revealed the details of her trip to Israel, but No 10 only learnt on Tuesday about the meeting with Mr Erdan. No British officials were present and like her meetings in Israel, she did not report them to the Foreign Office or Government in the usual way. She was accompanied at all the meetings bar one in Israel by the honorary president of the Conservative Friends for Israel lobbying group, Lord Polak. Labour has already demanded an investigation by the Prime Minister's standards adviser into Ms Patel's meetings with the Israeli government, claiming they involved four "serious breaches" of the ministerial code. Before the extra meetings were revealed, Downing Street insisted Mrs May continued to have confidence in Ms Patel, who was in Africa with International Trade Secretary Liam Fox, after giving her a dressing down on Monday over her trip to Israel. Number 10 confirmed that Ms Patel had discussed the possibility of UK aid being used to support medical assistance for refugees from the Syrian civil war arriving in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. However the Prime Minister's official spokesman was unable to say whether she had explained when she met Mrs May that the scheme would have involved supplying funding to the Israeli army. In a letter to Mrs May, shadow Cabinet Office minister Jon Trickett said she should either call in her independent adviser on ministerial standards, Sir Alex Allen, or "state publicly and explain your full reasons for why Priti Patel retains your confidence despite clear breaches of the ministerial code". Mr Trickett said there were "strong grounds" to believe Ms Patel had broken the code's requirements for openness, collective responsibility, honesty and performing only those duties allocated by the PM. Labour sought to force Ms Patel to explain herself in the Commons by tabling an urgent question, but it was left to Middle East minister Alistair Burt to answer as MPs were told she had left on the trip to Africa. He said Foreign Office officials in Israel had only become aware of her visit on August 24, after she was already in the country. The Prime Minister was forced to remind Ms Patel of her obligations as a minister after it emerged that she took time out from a family holiday to meet Mr Netanyahu, other politicians, businesses and charities during a visit to Israel between August 13 and 25. The meetings were arranged by Lord Polak. On returning from her trip, Ms Patel commissioned Department for International Development (DfID) work on disability, humanitarian and development partnerships between Israel and the UK. Ms Patel only made Mrs May aware of the meetings on Friday, more than two months after they took place, when reports began to emerge of talks she held with a politician and a disability charity. The minister apologised and admitted a "lack of precision" for suggesting last week that Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson knew about the trip, and that only two meetings had taken place. Mrs May also took steps to tighten the ministerial code, asking Whitehall's top civil servant, Sir Jeremy Heywood, to look at how it can be clarified. Carl Sargeant was found dead at his home in Wales Photo: National Assembly for Wales handout via REUTERS A Welsh government minister has taken his own life just days after being suspended by the Labour Party in Wales over allegations of sexual misconduct. Carl Sargeant, a married father of two and minister in the Welsh Assembly, was found dead at his home in Connah's Quay in North Wales after Labour announced the investigation on Friday. Carwyn Jones, the Welsh first minister, said Mr Sargeant was being investigated over a "number of incidents" after women came forward with allegations. Mr Sargeant (49) said at the time that he found the allegations "shocking and distressing" and called for an independent investigation "to allow me to clear my name". A spokesman for North Wales Police said: "At approximately 11.30 (yesterday), North Wales Police were called to a report that the body of a man had been found at an address in Connah's Quay. North Wales Police are not treating his death as suspicious and the matter has been referred to HM Coroner." A family statement said his relatives were "devastated beyond words" at the loss of "the glue that bound us together" while Jeremy Corbyn, the UK Labour leader, described his death as "terrible and deeply shocking news". His family's statement said: "Carl was a much loved husband, father and friend. He wasn't simply a part of our family. He was the glue that bound us together. He was the heart of our family. We loved him so very much. "He was the most kind and caring husband, father, son and friend. We are devastated beyond words, and we know our grief will be shared by all those who knew and loved him. We are in shock and grief." In a statement on Friday, Mr Sargeant said: "I met with the first minister today and he informed me allegations had been made about my personal conduct, which was shocking and distressing to me. "The details of the allegations have yet to be disclosed to me. I have written to the general secretary of Welsh Labour requesting an urgent independent investigation into these allegations in order to allow me to clear my name." Mr Jones said on Monday that he had become "aware of a number of incidents at the beginning of last week". After news of Mr Sargeant's death emerged, Mr Jones said: "Carl was a friend as well as a colleague and I am shocked and deeply saddened by his death. "He made a big contribution to Welsh public life and fought tirelessly for those he represented." Telegraph Media Group Limited [2022] The Scotsman and Yorkshire Post owner Johnston Press has rejected a demand from its biggest investor for a shareholder vote on boardroom shake-up plans after claiming the paperwork submitted was invalid. Christen Ager-Hanssen whose Custos group owns a 20% stake in Johnston earlier this week formally called for a general meeting of shareholders to vote on proposals to appoint former Scottish National Party leader Alex Salmond to the board and for two directors to be ousted. He wants to remove chairman Camilla Rhodes and non-executive director Michael Butterworth and replace them with former first minister Mr Salmond and Steve Auckland, who previously ran regional newspaper group Local World, to spearhead an overhaul at the publisher. But Edinburgh-based Johnston, which also owns the i newspaper and some 200 local titles, said the request for an extraordinary general meeting was invalid, claiming the wrong person signed the paperwork. Expand Close Alex Salmond / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Alex Salmond In the event that the board receives a valid requisition request, the board will put the proposed resolution(s) to shareholders, Johnston said. Mr Ager-Hanssen, who owns the Swedish version of the Metro free newspaper, has led an increasingly vocal hostile campaign for a leadership change at Johnston in recent weeks. The Norwegian activist investor had already attempted to appoint four directors to Johnstons board last month, but the move was blocked by debt agreements stipulating that only existing board members can approve new director appointments. Shares in Johnston surged 9% on Tuesday after Johnston confirmed Mr Ager-Hanssens formal request for a shareholder meeting, but were down 3% after the latest twist in the saga. Johnston has struggled under a debt burden and plunging print advertising revenues. But the i newspaper which it bought from the owners of the Independent for 24 million in April last year has been helping offset ongoing tough conditions for its traditional titles. In September, it reported sharply narrowed half-year losses, to 10.2 million from 184 million a year earlier. However, total revenue still fell 3.1% to 102.9 million, amid a drop in classified sales. A source close to Johnston was dismissive of Mr Ager-Hanssens plans on Tuesday, saying: The company is in the midst of a complex and important refinancing and we have the momentum with the established team to ensure further progress with the strategic review and ensure a good outcome. Despite dozens of tweets and interviews, Custos has not yet produced a coherent strategy or plan, which would be good to see. The Saudi night of the long knives was followed by the sudden appearance of Saad Hariri in the Kingdom, announcing he was resigning as prime minister of Lebanon. Then came the news the Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas had been summoned to Riyadh. The 32-year-old Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia is seeking to exert control both at home and abroad, in the process ratcheting up tension in an already volatile Middle East. Mohammed Bin Salman al Saud wants to consolidate authority in Saudi Arabia in his hands and, at the same time, be the kingmaker in other lands. It is an extraordinarily high-risk strategy, and one even the seemingly uber-confident young prince would not have embarked on without a powerful outside sponsor. He appears to have found one. Donald Trump expressed support for the purge in a phone call to King Salman. The US president's son-in-law Jared Kushner paid a secretive visit to Riyadh a few days ago. But this support is likely to have come at a price. Mr Trump tweeted he wants the $2trn (1.7trn) float of Saudi oil giant Aramco to take place in New York. The president added he had raised the matter in the call to the Saudi king. The UK would be the loser in the by-product of this. London was hoping to be the place for the flotation, bringing with it a massive post-Brexit boost. The journeys of supplication by Theresa May and other ministers to Riyadh may have been in vain. Expand Close Saudi billionaire Prince AlWaleed bin Talal Photo: REUTERS/Hamad I Mohammed/File Photo / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Saudi billionaire Prince AlWaleed bin Talal Photo: REUTERS/Hamad I Mohammed/File Photo It remains to be seen whether Prince Mohammed's meteoric rise continues or whether he crashes and burns. Members of the royal family have been instructed not to leave the country. Dozens have been arrested, with due legal process ignored. This includes the kingdom's richest businessmen Prince Alawaleed bin Talal, whose investment portfolio includes hefty tranches of Rupert Murdoch's 20th Century Fox stock. The others detained include Prince Mutaib and Prince Turki, favourite sons of the late King Abdullah, respectively heads of the National Guard and the governor of Riyadh. The coup follows the crown prince's drive against the religious hierarchy, prominent conservative imams and their fervent supporters. So the crown prince appears to have taken a firm grip on the four pillars of the Kingdom: the ruling family, the business sheikhs, the security apparatus and the theocracy. His path to supreme power and, with it, the ability to bring about the reforms he wants, is seemingly assured. Then we have the curious case of Mr Hariri. He made his resignation speech not in his home country, but in Riyadh, on Saudi TV. He accused Iran and its Hezbollah Shia militia allies of holding Lebanon hostage, and destabilising the Arab region. This is also the Saudi position. Riyadh never liked that Hezbollah was a member of Lebanon's ruling coalition. This dislike has grown as the militia sent thousands of fighters for combat alongside Tehran's forces to prop up Bashar al-Assad. That Lebanese government will now collapse. Mr Hariri, say his critics, is now himself effectively a hostage in Saudi Arabia. Expand Close Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Photo: Presidency Press Service/Pool Photo via AP / Facebook Twitter Email Whatsapp Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Photo: Presidency Press Service/Pool Photo via AP Mr Abbas, the Palestinian leader, was the next to be asked to go to Riyadh. The Saudis have been trying to wean Hamas away from its Iranian backers, but it still remains suspicious of the Islamist movement. Mr Abbas, with Saudi encouragement, recently took on Hamas by imposing sanctions on Gaza. There has now been a highly publicised "reconciliation" between the two sides. But Prince Mohammed, who has already met a Hamas delegation recently, will want to ensure that the status quo is maintained to Saudi satisfaction. Will this foreign policy foray work for Prince Mohammed? Adding to the drama in Saudi Arabia was a missile attack launched from Yemen into the kingdom by the Houthis. Riyadh accused Iran, which backs the Houthis, of being responsible and called the attack "an act of war". The war in Yemen was the brainchild of the crown prince, a flexing of muscle after being appointed defence minister, to show toughness. It has been a disaster, with no sign of a victory, with hospitals and schools bombed and a cholera epidemic breaking out. Mr Trump sees this as an opportunity to sell more US arms to Saudis, but others in the Sunni military coalition, such as the UAE, are fed up with the whole bloody enterprise and just want it to go away. Similarly, a Saudi-led Sunni alliance started a blockade of Qatar in response to long held grievances, including Doha not being sufficiently aggressive towards Iran. Qatar, it was expected, would capitulate quickly to demands made by Riyadh. Not only has that not happened, but Qatar has moved closer to Iran and the Turks, who have troops based there - Recep Tayyip Erdogan challenging the Saudis for the leadership of Sunni states, with possible reinforcements. Then there is the Trump factor. The Saudis started the Qatari confrontation with what they saw as the US president's encouragement. Mr Kushner was playing a part as well. Rex Tillerson, secretary of state, was incensed an "absolutely vacuous kid was running a second foreign policy out of the White House family quarters". He and Defence Secretary James Mattis swung their support behind Qatar, a valued ally and centre of US military operations in the Middle East, and balanced US policy on the issue. It is not certain this time either that Prince Mohammed will continue to receive American support indefinitely, especially if it is tied to the Aramco flotation. Mr Trump himself had fears that this may not take place because of "litigation, risk and other risk, which is very sad". The risk is of Saudi assets in the US being seized as a result of the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (Jasta) passed by Congress under which families of 9/11 victims can take legal action against the Saudi government and nationals. Mr Trump had himself supported the Jasta Bill and castigated Barack Obama for opposing it. But then Mr Trump is hardly new to flip-flopping. It will be interesting to see what happens to Prince Mohammed's drive if American backing dries up. That can come about for reasons others than Aramco. Messrs Tillerson, Mattis and national-security adviser HR McMaster may well have different views to Mr Trump and his son-in-law. The last backlash against liberalisation led to a violent confrontation, a siege in Mecca in 1979 followed by a capitulation at the end by the Royal family to the clerics who got their hands on the levers of power. They went on to impose vicious Wahaabi rule at home and export terrorism abroad. What is unfolding in a Saudi sandstorm now will have repercussions well beyond its borders. Actress Olivia Newton-John poses with her boyfriend Patrick McDermott at the 10th Annual Human Rights Campaign Gala, February 17, 2001 in Los Angeles, CA The former boyfriend of Olivia Newton-John has reportedly been discovered after going missing 12 years ago. Patrick McDermott, an American cameraman of Korean descent who was the on and off boyfriend of Olivia Newton-John, is alive and well in a small town in Mexico, according to New Idea. Mr McDermott disappeared in 2005 while on a fishing trip. The then 48-year-old set off on the fishing boat Freedom from San Pedro Marina on 30 June but mysteriously disappeared, with personal items, including his wallet, left aboard. While a US Coast Guard investigation released in November 2008 concluded Mr McDermott "most likely" drowned, the circumstances around his disappearance triggered speculation that he faked his own death. In 2009, investigators on Dateline NBC claimed Mr McDermott disappeared to avoid debts - including $8,000 he allegedly owed to his ex-wife for child support. They later said they believed he was living in a boat off the west coast of Mexico. New Idea, a long-running Australian weekly magazine, has now claimed it has evidence Mr McDermott is alive after receiving photos by US media agency Coleman-Rayna which show a man who matches his description in the Mexican sun alongside a woman. "The widow's peak is exact. The eyes are very similar and the ears extend down on the head the same distance. I believe it is him, private detective, Charlie Parker, told the magazine. He claimed the individual in the photograph was a 90 per cent match to Mr McDermott. In March 2016, Mr McDermott, who has appeared on Americas Most Wanted, was reported to have been found living in Mexico with his German girlfriend. Newton-John, who played the lead role of Sandy in cult 1978 film Grease, has previously expressed grief about her former boyfriends disappearance. Last September, the British-Australian, who married her second husband John Easterling in 2008, told Australian TV series 60 minutes: "It's human to wonder but you know, those are the things in life you have to accept and let go. Because whenever you go through difficult times, there's always those concerns." She added: "But, I live on and of course questions come up, always, it's human." Syria has pledged to sign up to the Paris accord on climate change, leaving the US the only country opposed to the pact. The Arab state, in the midst of a six-year civil war, yesterday became the final functioning state to commit to the pact. "I would like to affirm the Syrian Arab Republic's commitment to the Paris climate change accord," Wadah Katmawi, deputy environment minister, said on the second day of climate talks in Bonn, Germany. Nicaragua had been the only other country outside the 195-nation agreement - which it criticised as being "too weak" - until it too signed up last month. The US, the world's largest economy and second biggest emitter of greenhouse gases after China, is the only government to have initiated withdrawal proceedings from the historic pact in its 23-year history. Overall, the Paris agreement seeks to limit a global rise in temperatures to "well below" 2C above pre-industrial times and ideally to 1.5C. President Donald Trump, who has expressed doubts that man-made greenhouse gas emissions are the prime cause of global warming, announced in June that he intended to pull out and instead promote US coal and oil industries. David Waskow, of the World Resources Institute think tank, noted that Mr Trump's climate views had previously isolated him from other leading economies in the Group of Seven and the Group of 20. "Now he'll be isolated from all nations," said Mr Waskow. Mr Trump has said he will pull out of the Paris agreement unless Washington can secure more favourable terms for American businesses and taxpayers. However, he has been vague about what that means - especially since the pact gives all nations power to set their own goals. Former President Barack Obama arrives for jury duty in the Daley Center on Wednesday, Nov. 8, 2017, in Chicago. Obama is in line to be paid the same $17.20 a day that others receive for reporting for jury duty. (Nancy Stone/Chicago Tribune via AP) Former US president Barack Obama has been dismissed from jury duty. The former president arrived at the Richard J. Daley Centre in central Chicago for jury duty shortly after 10am on Wednesday. By noon, Cook County chief judge Timothy Evans told reporters that Mr Obama would not be serving. Mr Obama's appearance at the courthouse created quite a stir. He was photographed outside by people who heard on the news that he would be going to court. In the courthouse lobby, people craned their necks for a glimpse of him and took mobile phone pictures. Mr Evans said the former president shook hands with other would-be jurors inside the jury assembly room and signed copies of his books that some had taken with them to court. Mr Obama was not the first former president to be called for jury duty. In 2015, former president George W. Bush answered the jury duty call in Dallas. He was not selected to sit on a jury. In 2003, Mr Bush's predecessor in the White House, Bill Clinton, reported for jury duty in federal court in New York City. He also was not selected. Nor is Mr Obama the first famous Chicagoan to be called. In 2004, TV star Oprah Winfrey was on a Chicago jury that convicted a man of murder. A decade later, actor Lawrence Tureaud, better known as Mr T, showed up to a suburban Chicago courthouse for jury duty, sporting his usual mohawk, but without the gold chains for which he is known. Despite the more subdued outfit, Mr T was not chosen to sit on a jury. Harvey Weinstein and Rose McGowan at an after party for the 'Grindhouse' movie premiere in Los Angeles in 2007 Photo: Jeff Vespa/WireImage Harvey Weinstein hired former spies and military personnel to stop his accusers going public with allegations of sexual misconduct, a leading magazine has reported. The private detectives are said to have used fake identities and recorded conversations to build a picture of those making the claims, according to The New Yorker. The Hollywood mogul reportedly hired Black Cube, a security firm that employs people once with the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad, and Kroll, the corporate intelligence giant. The article was written by Ronan Farrow, who reported some of the original Weinstein allegations. His piece says two Black Cube private investigators met with Rose McGowan, the actress who would later accuse Weinstein of raping her, to obtain information. One pretended to be a womens rights advocate while meeting McGowan and recorded some of the conversations, according to the magazine. Journalists investigating Weinstein were also said to have been approached in an apparent attempt to gain information about those making allegations. The magazine said documents were compiled detailing the women, their claims and even pictures of them alongside Weinstein after the alleged incidents. McGowan told the magazine: It scared me because I knew what it meant to be threatened by Harvey. I was in fear of him finding me. Sallie Hofmeister, Weinsteins spokesman, told the magazine: It is a fiction to suggest that any individuals were targeted or suppressed at any time. A spokesman for Black Cube said: It is Black Cubes policy to never discuss its clients with any third party, and to never confirm or deny any speculation made with regard to the companys work. Black Cube operates in full compliance with the law of any jurisdiction in which it operates. Telegraph Media Group Limited [2022] Pro-independence protesters have blocked roads and stopped trains as part of a general strike in Catalonia to protest against the jailing of ousted Catalan government officials and secessionist activists. Big traffic jams were reported on roads leading to Catalan cities, including the regional capital Barcelona, and on major highways. But the strike was not backed by Spain's two main unions and was not reported to be having any major effect on industry or the region's prized tourism sector. National railway operator Renfe said services were halted on dozens of local lines as protesters blocked railway lines. Several national high-speed lines were also affected. In northern Girona, several protesters pushed past police controls to enter the city's main railway station. Later, dozens of others occupied the tracks. Intersindical CSC, a platform of pro-independence workers' unions, had called the strike over labour issues. However, separatist parties and civil society groups asked workers to join the stoppage to protest over the Spanish government's moves against the Catalan bid for independence. At midday, several thousand pro-independence protesters packed a central square in Barcelona, waving separatist flags and chanting "Freedom" for the 10 people in custody in a judicial probe into rebellion and sedition in the days before and after Catalonia's parliament ignored Spanish court rulings and declared independence on October 27. Six hours later, thousands gathered again to keep up the pressure on the Madrid-based national government. Some shouted: "Free the political prisoners." Agusti Alcoberro, the vice president of the grass-roots Catalan National Assembly told the midday crowd the arrests were an attack on democracy and a humiliation of Catalan people. Spanish authorities took the unprecedented step of seizing control of Catalonia, one of Spain's 17 autonomous regions, after a majority of regional lawmakers there ignored Constitutional Court orders and passed an independence declaration on October 27. Spain removed the regional government, dissolved the parliament and called a new regional election for next month. Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy said the elections should open "a new political era" in the region with the return to normality and respect for Spain's laws. Eight members of the dismissed Catalan Cabinet and two activists were sent to jail as a Spanish court studies possible charges of rebellion and sedition against them. Former Catalan regional president Carles Puigdemont and four of his aides have fled to Brussels, where they are fighting Spanish arrest and extradition orders. Their presence in the European capital is sowing divisions within the Belgian government. Some Belgian MPs have criticised Prime Minister Charles Michel for not taking tougher action against Mr Puigdemont, while others complain that the Catalan leader's presence is inflaming Flemish separatist sentiments in Belgium. Speaking to Belgian MPs, Mr Michel refused to comment on Mr Puigdemont's political actions, saying that his case must be handled by judicial authorities alone. He said: "Mr Puigdemont is a European citizen who must be held accountable for his actions just like any other European citizens - with rights and obligations but no privileges. " Mr Michel also stressed that the Spanish government remains his partner. Catalonia, with 7.5 million people, represents a fifth of Spain's gross domestic product and polls show its people roughly evenly divided over independence. Mr Puigdemont claimed a banned October 1 secession referendum gave it a mandate to declare independence. AP Tatyana Felgenhauer was "millimetres from death" following the attack (AP) A Russian radio journalist who narrowly survived a stabbing attack last month said her assailant was intent on killing her and had planned it. Tatyana Felgenhauer, a top host and deputy editor-in-chief at Ekho Moskvy, was stabbed in the throat at the station's offices in central Moscow last month and spent hours in a medically-induced coma. While Ekho Moskvy is majority-owned by a media arm of the state-controlled Gazprom natural gas giant, its programmes have often been critical of the government, angering many in Russian political and business circles. Its hosts and journalists have previously reported receiving death threats. Investigators identified Ms Felgenhauer's attacker as 48-year-old Boris Grits, who has Russian and Israeli citizenship. He is in custody and his testimony released by the police suggests that he might be mentally unstable. Pressed by rights activists, President Vladimir Putin rejected suggestions that the attack on Ms Felgenhauer was because of her critical reporting, calling the attacker a "sick man". The journalist, who was discharged from a hospital last week, told AP she is convinced that Grits was not deranged and knew what he was doing. "I'm confident that he is sane, he had planned it very carefully," said Ms Felgenhauer, who was wearing a scarf to hide her wounds. "He struck with determination." Doctors say the journalist still has to go through at least a two-month course of rehabilitation before she can return to air. The attack on Ms Felgenhauer, the latest in a string of assaults on journalists and opposition activists in Moscow, came two weeks after a state-owned television station targeted Ms Felgenhauer in a smear piece. Rossiya 24 claimed that Ekho Moskvy was paid for "destabilising society" ahead of Russia's presidential election in March. The radio station has petitioned the investigators to look into a possible link between the attacker and the smear report, Ekho Moskvy's editor-in-chief Alexei Venediktov said. The case file that the station's lawyers have access to suggests that the attacker had an accomplice, he said. "There are several weird elements in this case ... that testify to the fact that he knew something that he won't speak about ... and that he had accomplices," Mr Venediktov said. Ekho's corridors on Wednesday were busy, and the guest room where Ms Felgenhauer was attacked had no traces of the horrific scenes a month earlier. But the mood was wary. Mr Venediktov said: "(We feel) relief because Tatyana was four millimetres away from death. " The attacker's knife missed the vital organs just by a scratch. "There is also anxiety because a journalist was attacked and nearly killed at her workplace." The station is working to boost security measures, he said. AP Devin Kelley, the suspect in the shooting at First Baptist Church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, once escaped a mental health facility (Texas Department of Public Safety via AP, File) A gunman who killed more than two dozen at a small-town Texas church briefly escaped from a mental health facility in New Mexico in 2012, police reports indicate. The reports also noted that Devin Patrick Kelley was once caught trying to bring guns onto a military base and threatened superior officers there. Kelley was also named as a suspect in a 2013 sexual assault in New Braunfels, about 35 miles from the scene of Sunday's church attack in Sutherland Springs. The records that emerged on Tuesday add up to at least three missed opportunities that might have offered law enforcement a way to stop Kelley from having access to guns long before he slaughtered much of the congregation in the middle of a service. Authorities said the death toll of 26 included the unborn baby of one of the women killed. Kelley died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound after he was chased by bystanders and crashed his car. The Air Force confirmed on Tuesday that Kelley had been treated in the facility after he was placed under pretrial confinement stemming from a court-martial on charges that he assaulted his then-wife and hit her child hard enough to fracture the boy's skull. Involuntary commitment to a mental institution would have been grounds to deny him a weapon provided that records of his confinement were submitted to the federal database used to conduct background checks on people who try to purchase guns. Kelley was also caught trying to bring guns onto Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico when he was stationed there, according to an El Paso, Texas, police report released on Tuesday. While in the military, Kelley, who was 21 at the time, made death threats against superior officers, according to the June 2012 report, which also mentioned the military charges. He was eventually sentenced to 12 months of confinement for the assault. The Air Force acknowledged Monday that it did not enter Kelley's criminal history into the federal database as required by military rules, another way he could have been denied a weapon. Had Kelley been convicted of sexual assault, he would likely have been prevented from purchasing a gun because federal guidelines prohibit sales to anyone convicted of a felony punishable by more than one year in prison. The Comal County sheriff said he was reviewing whether his department mishandled the sexual assault investigation. Authorities recovered a Ruger AR-556 rifle at the church and two handguns from the shooter's vehicle. All three weapons were purchased by Kelley, said Fred Milanowski, the agent in charge of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in Houston. The El Paso report notes that Kelley was committed to a mental health facility in Santa Teresa, New Mexico, but at some point escaped and was later found by police at a bus station in downtown El Paso in June 2012. Deputies were called to Kelley's home in New Braunfels in June 2013 about the rape case and investigated for three months, Comal County Sheriff Mark Reynolds said. But it appeared that they stopped investigating after they believed Kelley left Texas and moved to Colorado. Mr Reynolds said the case was then listed as inactive. The sheriff said he was trying to determine how deputies came to believe Kelley had moved and why they did not continue to pursue the case, either in Colorado or after Kelley returned to the area later. Deputies were called to the same house in February 2014 to investigate a domestic violence report involving Kelley and Danielle Shields, his girlfriend at the time, whom he married two months later. (AP) US President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump arrive on Air Force One in Beijing, China (Thomas Peter/Pool Photo via AP) US President Donald Trump nodded appreciatively as China's leader Xi Jinping showcased a centuries-old temple during a visit to Beijing's Forbidden City. He clapped along as the two leaders watched a Chinese children's opera, and the men shared a traditional tea and salutations of friendship. Mr Trump's two-day visit to China opened with diplomatic niceties aplenty on Wednesday. But thorny issues await the two world leaders behind closed doors, including potential tensions over trade and China's willingness to put the squeeze on North Korea over its nuclear weapons programme. Ahead of his arrival, Mr Trump delivered a stern message to Beijing, using an address to the National Assembly in South Korea to call on nations to confront the North. "All responsible nations must join forces to isolate the brutal regime of North Korea," Mr Trump said. "You cannot support, you cannot supply, you cannot accept." He called on "every nation, including China and Russia", to fully implement UN Security Council resolutions against North Korea enforcing sanctions aimed at depriving its government of revenue for its nuclear and ballistic missile programmes. The latest measure, adopted after a September atomic test explosion, the North's largest yet, banned imports of its textiles and prohibited new work permits for overseas North Korean workers. It also restricted exports of some petroleum products. White House officials said Mr Trump would make the same pitch to Mr Xi in private when the two sit down together on Thursday. China is North Korea's largest trading partner and Mr Trump is expected to demand that the nation curtail its dealings with Pyongyang and expel North Korean workers from its borders. Mr Trump has praised China for taking some steps against Pyongyang, but he wants them to do more. China is increasingly disenchanted with North Korea over its nuclear weapons development but remains wary of using its full economic leverage over its traditional ally. It fears triggering a collapse of the North's totalitarian regime that could cause an influx of refugees into north-eastern China and culminate in a US-allied unified Korea on its border. China poured on the pomp and pageantry for Mr Trump's arrival. The president and first lady Melania Trump were greeted at the airport by dozens of children who waved US and Chinese flags and jumped up and down. The couple spent the first hours of their visit on a private tour of the Forbidden City, Beijing's ancient imperial palace. It is usually teeming with tourists but was closed to the public for the presidential visit. The Trumps walked alongside Mr Xi and his wife through the historic site and admired artefacts from past centuries. Mr Trump posed for photos and, with a wave of his hand, joked to Mr Xi about the reporters watching. He laughed and clapped along during an outdoor opera featuring colourful costumes, martial arts and atonal music. Mr Trump said afterwards that he was "having a great time" in China. But much of the remainder of his stay in Beijing will revolve around deep negotiations over trade with Pyongyang and other matters. The president also is expected to showcase a round of business deals signed Wednesday by Chinese and US companies. Such contract signings are a fixture of visits by foreign leaders to China and are aimed at blunting criticism of Beijing's trade practices. It's "a way of distracting from the fact that there's been no progress in China on structural reform, market access or the big issues that the president has tried to make progress on with regard to China", said Elizabeth Economy, the director for Asia Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. AP Britains corruption watchdog has said it will continue to investigate individuals linked to Rolls-Royce after US authorities charged five people who allegedly bribed government officials to help the engineering giant secure a major contract. The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) said its probe into the conduct of people connected with Rolls-Royces civil, defence and marine divisions as well as the firms former energy arm was continuing. The US Department of Justice announced on Tuesday that three former employees of Roll-Royces now defunct energy operation James Finley, Keith Barnett and Aloysius Zuurhout had been charged with bribery and corruption offences. It added that Andreas Kohler, the director of an engineering consultancy firm working with a former Rolls-Royce customer in Kazakhstan, and Petros Contoguris, who acted as an intermediary for the engine maker in Kazakhstan, were also charged. The unsealed charges meaning they are now being made public are linked to their alleged involvement in a scheme to bribe government officials to help secure a contract to supply equipment and services for a gas pipeline running from Central Asia to China. It comes after Rolls-Royce agreed to pay 671 million in January to British, US and Brazilian authorities to settle bribery and corruption claims involving intermediaries in overseas markets. Unveiling the charges on Tuesday, acting assistant attorney general Kenneth Blanco, of the DoJs criminal division, said: Thanks to the co-ordinated efforts by our prosecutors and agents working closely with their counterparts in Brazil and at the United Kingdoms Serious Fraud Office, among others these defendants, many of whom reside overseas, will face justice in this case, which represents another important step towards levelling the playing field for all ethical and honest businesses. Mr Finley, the 66-year-old former vice president and global head of sales for Rolls-Royces energy division, a British citizen now living in Taiwan, has pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and one count of violating the FCPA. Mr Zuurhout, 53, former sales manager of the engineering firms energy division, from the Netherlands, has pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to violate the FCPA. Mr Barnett, the 48-year-old former regional director of the engine-makers energy division, who lives in Houston, Texas, has pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to violate the FCPA. Mr Kohler, 53, of Austria, has also pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to violate the FCPA. Mr Contoguris, a Greek citizen living in Turkey, has been charged with one count of conspiracy to violate the FCPA, one count of conspiracy to launder money, seven counts of violating the FCPA and 10 counts of money laundering. The DoJ said Mr Contoguris is believed to be outside the United States. A spokesman for Rolls-Royce said: Rolls-Royce has committed to full ongoing co-operation with the Department of Justice and cannot comment on action against individuals. Priti Patel has quit her Cabinet role and acknowledged that her "actions fell below the standards of transparency and openness" she had advocated. Her decision to resign as International Development Secretary came after being summoned back from an official visit to Africa for a showdown with Theresa May in Downing Street. Ms Patel had been intending to spend three days in Kenya and Uganda, but was forced to cut short her trip and return home from Nairobi to explain the disclosure of further unauthorised meetings with Israeli politicians. In a letter to the Prime Minister, Ms Patel said: "I offer a fulsome apology to you and to the Government for what has happened and offer my resignation." Ms Patel's downfall came after it emerged she had a series of 12 meetings with senior Israeli figures during a holiday in the country in August. She then held two additional meetings, one in the UK and one in the US, following her return from Israel. In a further development, the Israeli Haaretz newspaper reported that during her stay in the country she visited an Israeli military field hospital in the occupied Golan Heights. In her letter Ms Patel said: "In recent days there have been a number of reports about my actions and I am sorry that these have served as a distraction from the work of the Department for International Development and of the Government as a whole. "As you know from our discussions I accept that in meeting with organisations and politicians during a private holiday in Israel my actions fell below the high standards that are expected of a Secretary of State. "While my actions were meant with the best of intentions, my actions also fell below the standards of transparency and openness that I have promoted and advocated." The meetings, without officials and in relation to one of the most sensitive areas of foreign policy, led to Ms Patel apologising and being given a dressing down by Mrs May on Monday. But the disclosures since then added to pressure on Ms Patel, culminating in a flight back from her curtailed Africa trip and a meeting in Downing Street lasting around 30 minutes during which it was made clear her Cabinet career was over. In her reply to Ms Patel, Mrs May said: "As you know, the UK and Israel are close allies, and it is right that we should work closely together. "But that must be done formally, and through official channels. "That is why, when we met on Monday, I was glad to accept your apology and welcomed your clarification about the trip to Israel over the summer. "Now that further details have come to light, it is right that you have decided to resign and adhere to the high standards of transparency and openness that you have advocated." Under intense media scrutiny - including thousands of people following the progress of her plane on a flight tracking website - Ms Patel arrived back in the UK on a Kenya Airways flight to Heathrow. Ms Patel's early return to the UK followed the disclosure that she met Israeli public security minister Gilad Erdan in Parliament on September 7, and foreign ministry official Yuval Rotem in New York on September 18. It is understood that Downing Street was told about the New York breakfast with Mr Rotem when Ms Patel revealed the details of her trip to Israel, but No 10 only learnt on Tuesday about the meeting with Mr Erdan. No British officials were present and, like her meetings in Israel, she did not report them to the Foreign Office or Government in the usual way. She was accompanied at all the meetings bar one in Israel by the honorary president of the Conservative Friends of Israel lobbying group, Lord Polak. Labour has already demanded an investigation by the Prime Minister's standards adviser into Ms Patel's meetings with the Israeli government, claiming they involved four "serious breaches" of the ministerial code. Number 10 confirmed that Ms Patel had discussed the possibility of UK aid being used to support medical assistance for refugees from the Syrian civil war arriving in the Golan Heights. However the Prime Minister's official spokesman was unable to say whether she had explained when she met Mrs May that the scheme would have involved supplying funding to the Israeli army. On returning from Israel, Ms Patel commissioned work by DfID on disability, humanitarian and development partnerships between Israel and the UK. Ms Patel only made Mrs May aware of the meetings on Friday, more than two months after they took place, when reports began to emerge of talks she held with a politician and a disability charity. The minister apologised and admitted a "lack of precision" for suggesting last week that Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson knew about the trip, and that only two meetings had taken place. US and Chinese companies have signed business deals valued at nine billion US dollars (6.84 billion) during a visit by President Donald Trump in a traditional move aimed at blunting criticism of Beijing's trade practices. China's biggest online retailer said it pledged to buy American beef and pork worth 1.2 billion dollars (912 million), but no other details were released of the 19 agreements signed at a ceremony attended by US commerce secretary Wilbur Ross. Such contract signings are a fixture of visits by foreign leaders to China and often involve agreements negotiated weeks or even months in advance which Beijing have saved to showcase its importance as a market. Mr Trump has made narrowing the multibillion-dollar US trade deficit with China a priority for his administration. He is due to hold talks with Chinese president Xi Jinping. Mr Ross said: "Addressing the imbalance in China trade has been a central focus of collaborative discussions between President Trump and President Xi. "And achieving fair and reciprocal treatment for the companies is a shared objective. "Today's signings are a good example of how we can productively build up our bilateral trade." Online retailer JD.com said it would buy beef from the Montana Stock Growers Association and pork from Smithfield Foods over the next three years. Smithfield is owned by China's WH Group, the world's biggest pork packer. JD.com said it would buy US goods worth two billion dollars (1.5 billion) over three years. China's trade surplus with the United States in October widened by 12.2% from a year earlier to 26.6 billion dollars (20.2 billion), according to Chinese customs data. The total surplus with the United States for the first 10 months of the year rose to 223 billion dollars (169 billion). The chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in China, William Zarit, expressed hope ahead of Mr Trump's arrival that the signing of business deals would not draw attention away from "structural issues", including Chinese limits on foreign activity in finance, healthcare and other industries. China is the third biggest export market for the United States after Canada and Mexico. US exports to China rose 77% from 2007 to 2016, but Washington reported a 347 billion dollar (263 billion) trade deficit with China last year. Meanwhile, motor giant Ford has announced it is launching a venture with a Chinese partner to develop electric vehicles for sale in China, the biggest market for the technology. The announcement of the 750 million US dollar (570 million) venture with Anhui Zotye Automobile Co adds to rising investment by global car makers in China's growing electric vehicle industry. Zotye already has its own electric vehicle business and said sales in the first 10 months of this year were up 14% over a year earlier at 22,500. Ford said previously it planned to offer electric versions of 70% of its models sold in China by 2025. Mercedes Benz makes electric cars with a Chinese partner, and other global brands including General Motors and Volkswagen AG have announced or are exploring similar ventures. Later, Chinese internet company Tencent said it had acquired a 12% stake in Snap, as the social media company struggles to boost user growth. Tencent runs the WeChat messaging app, as well as online payment platforms and games. Earlier this year, it bought a 5% stake in Tesla. Snap is the parent company of Snapchat, the camera app which lets people send short videos and images. The company, based in Venice, California, said in a regulatory filing that Tencent bought 145.8 million shares. Snap revealed Tuesday that its loss tripled to 443.2 million dollars (336 million) during the third quarter on weak user growth and revenue. The app is set for a redesign in order to make it easier to use. Snap faces intense competition from Apple, Facebook's Instagram and WhatsApp, as well as Google's YouTube. Shares, which had fallen 20% before the opening bell, cut those losses in half on news of the Tencent interest. JD Wetherspoon has posted rising first-quarter sales but warned that its costs have risen significantly over the last year. The pubs chain said like-for-like sales rose 6.1% in the 13 weeks to October 29, with total sales growing 4.3%. But chairman Tim Martin pointed to increased labour costs, business rates, utilities and sugar taxes weighing on the firm. He said: Although it is only a short period, the company has had a positive start to the year. Sales have continued at a slightly higher-than-expected level since we last reported on 15 September. Costs, as many pub and restaurant companies have indicated, have been significantly higher than last year, and further increases are expected in areas including labour, business rates, utilities and sugar taxes. However, the firm anticipates full-year trading to meet expectations and intends to open between 10 and 15 new pubs. Mr Martin, a staunch Brexit backer, also said the lowest food prices can be obtained by the UK by avoiding a transitional deal with the EU. This would enable the UK to scrap EU food tariffs, as permitted under World Trade Organisation rules, on food imported from outside the EU. Under WTO rules, tariffs would not then be charged on imports from the EU either, he said. His comments come as fears rise that Brexit could lead to a bonfire of food safety standards, with US products such as chlorinated chicken flooding the UK market in place of continental delicacies. Washington, Nov 6 (IBNS): It is very likely that 2017 will be one of the three hottest years on record, with many high-impact events including catastrophic hurricanes and floods, debilitating heatwaves and drought. Long-term indicators of climate change such as increasing carbon dioxide concentrations, sea level rise and ocean acidification continue unabated. Arctic sea ice coverage remains below average and previously stable Antarctic sea ice extent was at or near a record low. The World Meteorological Organizations provisional Statement on the State of the Climate says the average global temperature from January to September 2017 was approximately 1.1C above the pre-industrial era. As a result of a powerful El Nino, 2016 is likely to remain the warmest year on record, with 2017 and 2015 being second and/or third. 2013-2017 is set to be the warmest five-year period on record. The WMO statement which covers January to September - was released on the opening day of the United Nations climate change conference in Bonn. It includes information submitted by a wide range of UN agencies on human, socio-economic and environmental impacts as part of a drive to provide a more comprehensive, UN-wide policy brief for decision makers on the interplay between weather, climate and water and the UN global goals. The past three years have all been in the top three years in terms of temperature records. This is part of a long term warming trend, said WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas. We have witnessed extraordinary weather, including temperatures topping 50 degrees Celsius in Asia, record-breaking hurricanes in rapid succession in the Caribbean and Atlantic reaching as far as Ireland, devastating monsoon flooding affecting many millions of people and a relentless drought in East Africa. Many of these events and detailed scientific studies will determine exactly how many bear the tell-tale sign of climate change caused by increased greenhouse gas concentrations from human activities, he said. Patricia Espinosa, Executive Secretary of UN Climate Change which is hosting the Bonn conference, said: These findings underline the rising risks to people, economies and the very fabric of life on Earth if we fail to get on track with the aims and ambitions of the Paris Agreement. There is unprecedented and very welcome momentum among governments, but also cities, states, territories, regions, business and civil society. Bonn 2017 needs to be the launch pad towards the next, higher level of ambition by all nations and all sectors of society as we look to de-risk the future and maximize the opportunities from a fresh, forward-looking and sustainable development path, she added. Extreme events affect the food security of millions of people, especially the most vulnerable. A review of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) found that, in developing countries, agriculture (crops, livestock, fisheries, aquaculture and forestry) accounted for 26% of all the damage and loss associated with medium to large-scale storms, floods and drought. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), the global health impacts of heatwaves depend not only on the overall warming trend, but on how heatwaves are distributed across where people live. Recent research shows that the overall risk of heat-related illness or death has climbed steadily since 1980, with around 30% of the worlds population now living in climatic conditions that deliver prolonged extreme heatwaves. Between 2000 and 2016, the number of vulnerable people exposed to heatwave events has increased by approximately 125 million. In 2016, 23.5 million people were displaced during weather-related disasters. Consistent with previous years, the majority of these internal displacements were associated with floods or storms and occurred in the Asia-Pacific region. In Somalia, more than 760 000 internal displacements have been reported, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and International Organisation for Migration (IOM). The latest International Monetary Fund (IMF) World Economic Outlook indicates that adverse consequences are concentrated in countries with relatively hot climates and which are home to close to 60% of current global population. London, Nov 4 (IBNS): Cancer cells can be targeted and destroyed with the metal from the asteroid that caused the extinction of the dinosaurs, according to new research by an international collaboration between the University of Warwick and Sun Yat-Sen University in China. Researchers from the Professor Sadler and Professor OConnor groups in Warwicks Department of Chemistry and Professor Hui Chao's group at Sun Yat-Sen have demonstrated that iridium the worlds second densest metal can be used to kill cancer cells by filling them with deadly version of oxygen, without harming healthy tissue. The researchers created a compound of iridium and organic material, which can be directly targeted towards cancerous cells, transferring energy to the cells to turn the oxygen (O2) inside them into singlet oxygen, which is poisonous and kills the cell - without harming any healthy tissue, read the University of Warwick website. The process is triggered by shining visible laser light through the skin onto the cancerous area this reaches the light-reactive coating of the compound, and activates the metal to start filling the cancer with singlet oxygen. The researchers found that after attacking a model tumour of lung cancer cells, grown by the researchers in the laboratory to form a tumour-like sphere, with red laser light (which can penetrate deeply through the skin), the activated organic-iridium compound had penetrated and infused into every layer of the tumour to kill it demonstrating how effective and far-reaching this treatment is. They also proved that the method is safe to healthy cells by conducting the treatment on non-cancerous tissue and finding it had no effect. Furthermore, the researchers used state-of-the-art ultra-high resolution mass spectrometry to gain an unprecedented view of the individual proteins within the cancer cells allowing them to determine precisely which proteins are attacked by the organic-iridium compound. After vigorously analysing huge amounts of data - thousands of proteins from the model cancer cells, they concluded that the iridium compound had damaged the proteins for heat shock stress, and glucose metabolism, both known as key molecules in cancer. The University of Warwick has the UKs most advanced laboratory for this type of highly advanced mass spectrometry, and is a world-class centre of analytical science. Co-author Cookson Chiu is a postgraduate researcher in Warwicks Department of Chemistry, funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and Bruker. He commented: This project is a leap forward in understanding how these new iridium-based anti-cancer compounds are attacking cancer cells, introducing different mechanisms of action, to get around the resistance issue and tackle cancer from a different angle. Dr Pingyu Zhang and Dr Huaiyi Huang are Royal Society Newton International Fellows in Warwicks Department of Chemistry. Dr Zhang added: Our innovative approach to tackle cancer involving targeting important cellular proteins can lead to novel drugs with new mechanisms of action. These are urgently needed. In addition, research links between UK and Chinese academics will not only lead to lasting collaborations, but also have potential to open up the translation of new drugs into the clinic as a UK-China joint development Peter OConnor, Professor of Analytical Chemistry at Warwick, noted: Remarkable advances in modern mass spectrometry now allow us to analyse complex mixtures of proteins in cancer cells and pinpoint drug targets, on instruments that are sensitive enough to weigh even a single electron! Professor Peter Sadler is excited about where this work can lead. He said: The precious metal platinum is already used in more than 50% of cancer chemotherapies. The potential of other precious metals such as iridium to provide new targeted drugs which attack cancer cells in completely new ways and combat resistance, and which can be used safely with the minimum of side-effects, is now being explored. International collaborations can greatly hasten progress. Its certainly now time to try to make good medical use of the iridium delivered to us by an asteroid 66 million years ago! Photochemotherapy using laser light to target cancer is fast emerging as a viable, effective and non-invasive treatment. Patients are becoming increasingly resistant to traditional therapies, so it is vital to establish new pathways like this for fighting the disease. Iridium was first discovered in 1803, and its name comes from the Latin for rainbow. From the same family as platinum, it is hard, brittle, and is the worlds most corrosion-resistant metal. Yellow in colour, its melting point is more than 2400 Celsius. The metal is rare on Earth, but is abundant in meteoroids and large amounts of iridium have been discovered in the Earths crust from around 66 million years ago, leading to the theory that it came to this planet with an asteroid which caused the extinction of the dinosaurs. Distinguished as a Very Important Paper, the research, Organo-iridium photosensitizers can induce specific oxidative attack on proteins in cancer cells is published in the Wiley journal Angewandte Chemie. Image: Wikimedia Commons Guwahati, Nov 7(IBNS) : Assam forest minister Pramila Rani Brahma on Tuesday said foreign assist poachers gang and some militant groups of North East India are involved in the rhino killing incidents in Assam's Kaziranga National Park (KNP). Recently, poachers had killed three one horned rhinos, including a calf, inside the national park by using sophisticated weapons and took away its horn. While visiting the world heritage site, Assam forest minister said that, several evidence revealed that, foreign assist poachers gang and some militants of the region are involved in the rhino killing incidents. "Compare with previous years, rhino killing incidents in Kaziranga has been decreased, but we want to completely curb it and the state forest department, Kaziranga authority and Assam police have jointly prepared a master plan to protect wild animals in the state. Massive hunting operations against the poachers have been launched," Pramila Rani Brahma said. The minister also said the state forest department is thinking about covering the entire park by fencing. On the other hand, pro-talk ULFA leader Anup Chetia said some militant groups of North East India are involved in the rhino killing incidents in the world heritage site. "Few outfit groups of Assam, Nagaland and Manipur are involved in illegal wildlife trade and we will file complaints before Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh soon," Anup Chetia said. Poachers killed over 250 rhinos in Kaziranga in past a decade. (Reporting by Hemanta Kumar Nath) Kolkata, Nov 8 (IBNS): Hindustan Copper Limited will quadruple its production capacity from 3.4 MT to 12.4 MT within five years, said Santosh Sharma, CMD, Hindustan Copper Limited at a recent meeting in Kolkata. Development of a new underground mine at Chapri-Sideshwar and re-opening of closed underground copper project at Rakha Mines at Jharkhand, each with 1.5 MT annual copper production capacity, by floating a global tender is on the cards for the Mini-Ratna (Category I) PSU. Other upcoming projects of HCL, which is about to step into its golden jubilee year, includes expansion of an underground mine at Banwas, Rajasthan, to produce 0.6 MT copper, and the reopening of Kendadih mine in Jharkhand to have an expanded capacity of 0.21 MT. Implementation of these mine expansion schemes will incur an estimated capital expenditure of around USD 700 million said Sharma. Speaking about the HCLs social sector initiatives, Sharma said the company imparts skill development training recognised by National Skill Development Corporation to youths employed in its various copper projects, which helps them to be gainfully employed in other reputed firms. He said the company has implemented CSR plans to develop water, irrigation, infrastructure, health and sanitation, education, livelihood and income generation, women empowerment, environmental sustainability projects in 19 villages located close to its three major projects at Ghatshila in Jharkhand, Khetri in Rajasthan and Malanjkhand in Madhya Pradesh. Kolkata, Nov 8 (IBNS) Journalist-turned-author and communicator Mahul Brahma won the Brand Leadership Award 2017 given by CMO Asia. The award recognizes Brand Custodians and Brand Writers. Mahuls work was recognised as a commentator and author on luxury brands and brand custodian of mjunction, Indias largest B2B e-commerce company. Mahuls book Decoding Luxe, which has received praises from Ratan Tata, found a special mention at the event at Taj Bengal on Wednesday. Mahul said, It is a humbling experience to see managing a brand like mjunction and helping luxury brands understand the Indian market better with my book Decoding Luxe has been recognised by CMO Asia. I thank mjunction and CEO Mr Vinaya Varma for trusting me with the brand. I am thankful that my book on luxury brands Decoding Luxe is receiving so much love and blessings from leaders political and corporate alike. Mahul Brahma also acted in a short film which was selected and screened at 69th Cannes Film Festival. His feature film is due for release soon. Washington, Nov 8 (IBNS): A new NASA study adds evidence that a geothermal heat source called a mantle plume lies deep below Antarctica's Marie Byrd Land, explaining some of the melting that creates lakes and rivers under the ice sheet. Although the heat source isnt a new or increasing threat to the West Antarctic ice sheet, it may help explain why the ice sheet collapsed rapidly in an earlier era of rapid climate change, and why it is so unstable today. The stability of an ice sheet is closely related to how much water lubricates it from below, allowing glaciers to slide more easily, read the NASA website. Understanding the sources and future of the meltwater under West Antarctica is important for estimating the rate at which ice may be lost to the ocean in the future. Antarctica's bedrock is laced with rivers and lakes, the largest of which is the size of Lake Erie. Many lakes fill and drain rapidly, forcing the ice surface thousands of feet above them to rise and fall by as much as 20 feet (6 meters). The motion allows scientists to estimate where and how much water must exist at the base. Some 30 years ago, a scientist at the University of Colorado Denver suggested that heat from a mantle plume under Marie Byrd Land might explain regional volcanic activity and a topographic dome feature. Very recent seismic imaging has supported this concept. When Helene Seroussi of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, first heard the idea, however, "I thought it was crazy," she said. "I didn't see how we could have that amount of heat and still have ice on top of it." With few direct measurements existing from under the ice, Seroussi and Erik Ivins of JPL concluded the best way to study the mantle plume idea was by numerical modeling. They used the Ice Sheet System Model (ISSM), a numerical depiction of the physics of ice sheets developed by scientists at JPL and the University of California, Irvine. Seroussi enhanced the ISSM to capture natural sources of heating and heat transport from freezing, melting and liquid water; friction; and other processes. To assure the model was realistic, the scientists drew on observations of changes in the altitude of the ice sheet surface made by NASA's IceSat satellite and airborne Operation IceBridge campaign. "These place a powerful constraint on allowable melt rates -- the very thing we wanted to predict," Ivins said. Since the location and size of the possible mantle plume were unknown, they tested a full range of what was physically possible for multiple parameters, producing dozens of different simulations. They found that the flux of energy from the mantle plume must be no more than 150 milliwatts per square meter. For comparison, in U.S. regions with no volcanic activity, the heat flux from Earth's mantle is 40 to 60 milliwatts. Under Yellowstone National Park -- a well-known geothermal hot spot -- the heat from below is about 200 milliwatts per square meter averaged over the entire park, though individual geothermal features such as geysers are much hotter. Seroussi and Ivins' simulations using a heat flow higher than 150 milliwatts per square meter showed too much melting to be compatible with the space-based data, except in one location: an area inland of the Ross Sea known for intense flows of water. This region required a heat flow of at least 150-180 milliwatts per square meter to agree with the observations. However, seismic imaging has shown that mantle heat in this region may reach the ice sheet through a rift, that is, a fracture in Earth's crust such as appears in Africa's Great Rift Valley. Mantle plumes are thought to be narrow streams of hot rock rising through Earth's mantle and spreading out like a mushroom cap under the crust. The buoyancy of the material, some of it molten, causes the crust to bulge upward. The theory of mantle plumes was proposed in the 1970s to explain geothermal activity that occurs far from the boundary of a tectonic plate, such as Hawaii and Yellowstone. The Marie Byrd Land mantle plume formed 50 to 110 million years ago, long before the West Antarctic ice sheet came into existence. At the end of the last ice age around 11,000 years ago, the ice sheet went through a period of rapid, sustained ice loss when changes in global weather patterns and rising sea levels pushed warm water closer to the ice sheet -- just as is happening today. Seroussi and Ivins suggest the mantle plume could facilitate this kind of rapid loss. Their paper, "Influence of a West Antarctic mantle plume on ice sheet basal conditions," was published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth. Image credits: NSF/Zina Deretsky London, Nov 8 (IBNS): A new study published in the Royal Society journal Open Biology has suggested that sheep can recognise human faces. The study was done by Cambridge University researchers, who said that they were able to train sheep to recognise faces of actors Jake Gyllenhaal and Emma Watson, former US President Barack Obama and BBC newsreader Fiona Bruce. Results said that the sheep were able to spot the right face on more than one occasions. The BBC quoted researchers as stating that "sheep possess similar face recognition abilities to primates." The research's lead author Prof Jenny Morton said, "What we did is ask whether a sheep could learn to recognise someone from a photograph." "We focused on whether or not an animal was capable of processing a two-dimensional object as a person," Morton added. The study involved eight female Welsh Mountain sheep. Image: Wallpaper New Delhi, Nov 8 (IBNS): Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday greeted senior BJP leader and former party president Lal Krishna Advani on the latter's birthday. Advani turned 90 on Wednesday. The Prime Minister hailed Advani as a political stalwart and acknowledged his efforts in building the BJP, the ruling right-wing Indian political outfit. "Advani Ji is a political stalwart, a leader who has distinguished himself through hardwork and dedication towards our nation," the Prime Minister's tweet read. We BJP Karyakartas are fortunate to always receive the guidance of Advani Ji. His efforts have contributed richly to the building of BJP. Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) November 8, 2017 "We BJP Karyakartas are fortunate to always receive the guidance of Advani Ji. His efforts have contributed richly to the building of BJP," he said. New Delhi, Nov 8 (IBNS) : Delhi's Education Minister Manish Sisodia on Wednesday ordered all the schools in Delhi to remain closed till Sunday as a huge blanket of poisonous smog covered the national capital for the second consecutive day, reports said. All schools remained closed on Wednesday as a result of an earlier order on Tuesday. "The condition of air in Delhi is getting worse. We cannot compromise on children's health in such a condition. I have asked all schools to remain closed till Sunday," Sisodia tweeted in Hindi. The Government's decision followed a tweet by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday, in which he called the city a "gas chamber" and asked Sisodia to consider shutting the schools for a few days. "Delhi has become a gas chamber. Every year this happens during this part of year. We have to find a solution to crop burning in adjoining states," Kejriwal had tweeted Delhi and its adjoining suburbs remained enveloped by the smog on Wednesday morning as well, forcing visibility to dip to 300 meters at some places, causing train delays and slowing down flight operations. The Delhi Government has also issued a health advisory for high risk people, including children, the elderly, pregnant women and those suffering from asthma and heart ailments against venturing outdoors in particular times. New Delhi, Nov 8 (IBNS): Sushma Swaraj, Minister of External Affairs, on Wednesday met with Maria Angela Holguin, Minister of External Relations of Colombia who along with Maria Lorena Gutierrez, Minister of Commerce, Industry and Tourism of Colombia and other delegates is visiting India from Nov 6 to 9. India and Colombia enjoy close and cordial bilateral relations. The economic cooperation between the two countries is deepening. During the meeting, EAM and visiting Minister of External Relations held discussions on a wide-range of issues of shared common interest to further expand and strengthen bilateral relations. India has extended assistance to Colombia in Capacity Building under its ITEC programme and expressed readiness to extend cooperation in the post peace process reconstruction and rehabilitation. The visiting delegation also met with Minister of Commerce and Industry of India and undertook a comprehensive review of trade and investment issues discussed during the meetings of Joint Committee on Business Development Cooperation (JCBD) and Joint Working Group on Trade & Investment held at Bogota in May, 2017, read a government statement. The Colombian Minister of External Relations delivered a lecture on overall situation in post-conflict Colombia at the Indian Council for World Affairs ( ICWA). The visiting ministers are also scheduled to address the business community at an event being organized by Confederation of Indian Industries (CII). Image: Raveesh Kumar Twitter page New Delhi, Nov 8 (IBNS): Minister of State M.J. Akbar visited Finland from Nov 5-7, 2017 at the invitation of Timo Soini, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Finland. The visit coincided with the celebration of 100 years of independence of Finland and enabled both countries to continue the regular high level dialogue and review ongoing bilateral cooperation. During the visit, MOS met Foreign Minister Finland, Timo Soini, and discussed various aspects of India-Finland bilateral relations and ways to strengthen it. Both Ministers exchanged views on significant regional and global developments of mutual interest. MOS also met Peter Stenlund, Secretary of State in the Finnish Foreign Ministry. A Visa Exemption Agreement for diplomatic passport holders was signed during the visit, read a statement issued by the MEA. MOS had separate meetings with Kai Mykkanen, Minister for Foreign Trade and Development, and Kimmo Tiilikainen, Minister of Housing, Energy and Environment. MOS also met Mauri Pekkarinen, Deputy Speaker of Parliament of Finland and discussed the possibilities of closer parliamentary ties between the two countries. MOS delivered a talk on "India's experience in countering violent extremism and terrorism" at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs. MOS visited Aalto University and interacted with the Indian students of the University. MOS met the members of the Indian community in a Reception hosted in his honor by Ambassador of India. Guwahati, Nov 8 (IBNS) : Security forces on Wednesday apprehended two militants belonging to the banned outfit NDFB-S in Assam's Chirang district, officials said. Chirang district SP Shankar Raimedhi said that based on intelligence input, army and police had launched operation under the leadership of SDPO, Bijni and OC, Panbari police station at Dwimuguri village under Panbari police station in the BTAD district and nabbed two militants. The nabbed militants were identified as Sukron Basumatary alias B. Saorailang and Badam Goyari. Security personnel had recovered one Country made Pistol with live rounds and large amount of rations and logistics support stores in possession from them. According to recent intelligence inputs it has come to light that, B. Saorailang was inducted into Chirang to probably meet Bedai group to provide much needed administrative and logistics support and strengthen the dwindling number of cadres active in the area. "The apprehension of B. Saorailang with his accomplice has given a severe jolt to the efforts to revive logistics support network of NDFB-S and has further degraded the morale of cadres attempting various unlawful activities," the top cop said. They have been brought to Panbari police station for thorough interrogation. (Reporting by Hemanta Kumar Nath) Image:google maps Srinagar, Nov 8 (IBNS): Former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah on Wednesday met Indian Interlocutor Dineshwar Sharma at his Gupkar based residence in Kashmir capital Srinagar. Government of India has appointed Sharma to talk to all the stakeholders in Jammu and Kashmir and so far he has interacted with a number of lesser known apolitical groups. Sources said that Sharma drove to the house of Omar Abdullah and interacted with him. After the meeting Omar Abdullah took to twitter and wrote: Mr Dineshawar Sharma & I met at my residence in Srinagar this morning. We discussed the prevailing situation in the state as also steps that can be taken to make his visits to the state more meaningful. Talking to reporters after the meet, Abdullah said that Sharma called him and asked for suggestions on the job assigned to him. He asked for my opinion on how to effectively go about the work assigned to him. I hope he will act on my suggestions, said Abdullah. He also said that sitting in a guesthouse and waiting for people to come and meet him wont yield results. The call follows a reported decision on Saturday by Saudi Arabia, which is leading the coalition fighting Houthi separatists in the country, to close air and sea ports in Yemen. The three-year conflict has claimed the lives of well over 5,000 civilians and contributed to one of the worlds biggest humanitarian disasters, according to the United Nations. Yemen imports up to 90 per cent of its daily needs and seven million people are being kept alive by humanitarian aid. Humanitarian operations are being blocked as a result of the closure ordered by the Saudi-led coalition, Jens Laerke, a spokesperson for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) told reporters at the regular press briefing in Geneva. He said the UN has received reports that in some areas, the blockade is now impacting the daily life of Yemenis, with fuel prices jumping up to 60 per cent overnight and cooking gas jumping up to 100 per cent. Long lines of cars are queuing at gas stations, he added. Laerke said humanitarian flights to and from Yemen were put on hold, and the coalition had asked UN personnel to tell all ships arriving at the sea ports of Hodeida and Saleef to leave. He told reporters that the current situation in Yemen is catastrophic. Some seven million people are on the brink of famine and were only being kept alive thanks to humanitarian operations. That lifeline has to be kept open and it is absolutely essential that the operation of the United Nations Humanitarian Air Service (UNHAS) be allowed to continue unhindered, he stressed. Echoing these concerns, the Office of the UN high Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) also expressed alarm at a series of attacks on civilians in recent days that have killed dozens of people, including several children. On 1 November, OHCHR said, two airstrikes Saudi-led coalition hit a market in Saada governorate, killing 31 traders and guests at a hotel. The following day in Taiz, a Houthi shelling left five children dead, according to OHCHR Spokesperson Rupert Colville. He added that survivors said the children were playing in the street when a rocket from a Houthi-controlled area fell on them. Colville added that UN human rights chief Zeid Raad Al Hussein will soon be appointing an expert panel mandated by the Human Rights Council to investigate alleged violations and abuses of international human rights and international law committed by all parties to the conflict. If possible, the Group of Eminent Experts will identify those responsible. Photo: Giles Clarke/OCHA Source: www.justearthnews.com New York, Nov 8(Just Earth News): The Security Council on Tuesday extended the authorization of the European Union-led multinational stabilization force in Bosnia and Herzegovina for an additional year, following an analysis by a United Nations envoy that a resurgence of divisive nationalism is threatening to take the country backwards. Bosnia and Herzegovina is a complex political and security environment, where negative scenarios can quickly endanger the Dayton Peace Agreement and the progress achieved so far, Valentin Inzko, the High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina, told the Security Council. For this reason, I am firmly convinced that there is still the necessity to maintain the EU military force on the ground with an executive mandate, he said. Unanimously adopting a resolution, the 15-member Council recognized the right of both European Union Force Althea (EUFOR ALTHEA) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) presence to take all necessary measures to defend themselves from attack or threat of attack and authorized Member States to assist both organizations in carrying out their missions. The Council also urged all parties to step up the implementation of comprehensive reforms, in an inclusive manner, to the benefit of all citizens and in line with the European perspective the country is committed to, calling on them to refrain from any polarizing policy, action and rhetoric. Inzko noted that more than 25 years have passed since Bosnia and Herzegovina joined the United Nations in 1992, and more than two decades have passed since the tragic conflict came to an end in 1995. The country has since made remarkable progress in many ways, he said, highlighting that the state institutions provided for under the Peace Agreement were established and the three armies that fought each other were unified into one. Today the country is at a crucial moment in its history, as leaders of all ethnic affiliations aspire to join the European Union and are working towards fulfilling the requirements necessary for the country to be granted EU candidate status, he said. However, he continued, As progress on economic and political reforms has significantly slowed down over the last ten years, divisive nationalism and persistent challenges to the Peace Agreement and the institutional arrangements provided for under that agreement have threatened to take the country backwards. Over the last six months, many key political actors in Bosnia and Herzegovina have been unwilling to search for the compromises needed to adopt necessary reforms. And with the general elections expected to take place next year, many political leaders have already started exchanging divisive rhetoric rooted in the past and an early electoral agenda have slowed the pace of reform and affected the political climate, he said. In July, the Constitutional Court struck down provisions of the election law regulating indirect elections to the Federation House of Peoples. If the House is not formed after the next elections, this will most likely prevent the formation of a Federation government and the formation of one chamber of the state-level parliament. I want to call attention to this issue now, while there is still time for the parties in parliament to address the problem ahead of the 2018 elections, he said. Also, in October, the Republika Srpksa National Assembly adopted a resolution which asserts the entitys neutrality vis-a-vis integration with NATO. He insisted that foreign policy is an exclusive responsibility of the state institutions. In conclusion, Inzko outlined the major challenges for the political leaders and institutions in Bosnia and Herzegovina. These include completion of the actions needed to achieve the next steps in Euro-Atlantic integration, ensuring that the 2018 elections can be held and their results implemented smoothly, and the rule of law under which the decisions of courts and the Dayton Peace Agreement are respected and implemented, he said. UN Photo/Cia Pak Source: www.justearthnews.com New Delhi, Nov 8 (IBNS): Union Minister for I&B, Smriti Irani, on Wednesday, flagged off the Digital Rath to create awareness among people for regrding cashless transactions, according to media reports. The Digital Rath is scheduled to travel 20,000 km and conclude its journey on Dec 31, 2017 It will travel from Delhi to Lucknow, then to Kolkata, Pondicherry, Mumbai and Bhopal. Image: CAIT/Twitter Kabul, Nov 8 (IBNS): A coordinated attack by the Taliban militants were repulsed by Afghan forces in Maidan Wardak province of the country, local Khaama Press reported. The incident took place on Tuesday night. Militants attacked the police academy in Syedabad district which initiated in a gun battle, resulting in the death of at least 15 militants. The report was confirmed by Provincial governor Zondi Gul Zamani. Officials have also added that the security forces have not suffered any casualties. The Taliban has not commented on the report so far. Image: twitter.com/realDonaldTrump Seoul/Washington, Nov 8 (IBNS): US President Donald Trump has said that he wants 'peace through strength', while addressing a meeting in South Korea on Wednesday. "The U.S., under my administration, is completely rebuilding its military, and they're spending hundreds of billions of dollars to the newest and finest military equipment anywhere in the world, being built right now. I want peace through strength," the US President said. Speaking about North Korea, Trump accused the nation of defying pacts and said, "The North Korean regime has pursued its nuclear & ballistic missile programs in defiance of every assurance, agreement, & commitment it has made to the U.S. and its allies. It's broken all of those commitments." He also warned anyone against doubting US' resolution. "Anyone who doubts the strength or determination of the U.S. should look to our past....and you will doubt it no longer," the US President said. Ever since US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un's feud broke out in public, barbs have been exchanged almost regularly between the two nations. The ongoing war of words has kept several countries on its toes, including the likes of South Korea, Japan, China and Russia. While the US has blamed North Korea for violating international sanctions, the latter has shot back, holding America accountable for disrupting peace in the Korean peninsula. Speaking on the same, Trump said on Wednesday, "Together, we dream of a Korea that is free, a peninsula that is safe, and families that are reunited once again." Image: twitter.com/realDonaldTrump Washington./Beijing, Nov 8 (IBNS): US President Donald Trump has arrived in China for his three-day state visit to the nation. The President visited the Forbidden City. During the tour of the ancient palace, they visited Taihedian, Zhonghedian and Baohedian, the three main halls of the Forbidden City, Xinhua news agency reported. Chinese President Xi Jinping and his wife Peng Liyuan invited U.S. President Donald Trump and his wife Melania Trump to the city, as per the news agency report. Trump earlier tweeted: "Leaving South Korea now heading to China. Looking very much forward to meeting and being with President Xi!." Many women in America or other western countries are choosing out-of-hospital childbirth, much to the dismay of insurance companies. In less developed countries such as India, out-of-hospital births are usually not a choice but a necessity. But even in that country, some upper-class women are joining the natural birth trend. Johanna Givens has a soothing way of helping women give birth at home. She counts with them -- barely speaking above a whisper -- as they work through the agonizing pain of each contraction. "When you get into really active, heavy labor, during the contraction, its like time stops often, and you are wrapped in this moment of discomfort and unsurety. So we have a counting mechanism to help them through, said Givens, who works as a doula, providing physical and emotional support to birthing women. In her seven years on the job in Columbia, Mo., shes attended the deliveries of more than 50 women who want an alternative to traditional hospital births. A growing number of American women are taking control of their childbirth by looking for out-of-hospital birthing options, much to the dismay of insurance companies and some medical professionals. In less developed countries such as India, meanwhile, out-of-hospital births are usually not a choice but a necessity -- happening mostly among poor women in remote places who lack access to care. But even in that country, some upper-class women are joining the natural birth trend. Jessica Henman CPMIn America, out-of-hospital births are clearly on the rise but far from the norm. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the proportion of births happening outside hospitals started to climb in 2004, rising from 1 percent then to 1.5 percent in 2015 -- or 61,000 births. In India, out-of-hospital births are far more common. UNICEF statistics show 53 percent of women gave birth outside of an institution in 2012. For women lucky enough to have a choice, experts say many are driven by a desire to make life processes like childbirth more natural instead of treating them like medical conditions. "A lot of women are talking about it, Givens said. Theyre talking about the breastfeeding movements. Theyre talking about the choice movements, the movements of letting our bodies naturally process. Johanna Givens Birth and choice in America In Givens home state of Missouri, out-of-hospital births have roughly doubled in 10 years. While this includes the occasional surprise delivery in an ambulance, it mostly reflects births at home or in birthing centers. Option is important and choice is important, Givens said. This is their body in which theyre going to be doing majority of the work and the consequences of what happens during that birth can last her lifetime and the childs lifetime. Birthing centers, which are generally associated with hospitals, offer a sort of middle ground. One, at the Missouri Womens and Childrens Hospital in Columbia, started as part of the hospitals low-intervention program in 2015. Women decide whether they want care from a certified nurse midwife or an obstetrician, and must meet guidelines showing their pregnancies are low-risk and not expected to need emergency interventions. Jessica Henman is a certified nurse midwife at a similar but free-standing facility in OFallon, Mo., called the Birth and Wellness Center. Natalie and Naomie CNMs have collaborative agreements with physicians, and Henmans agreement is with Dr. Jeffrey Mormol at the Missouri Baptist Medical Center, a 25 minute drive away. Not all women can give birth without medical intervention, so were glad we have the partnership with the hospital, so we can do that when we need to, Henman said. We like that about 90 percent of our moms dont need the hospital, and if you look at research for the right kind of woman, for a low-risk mother with a single baby, head down, no medical history, she might actually be safer outside the hospital than in it. But some doctors are skeptical about out-of-hospital births, particularly those in homes. Dr. Ravi Johar, an ob/gyn in St. Louis, said when something goes wrong with a pregnancy at home, he knows of instances when midwivessimply dropped birthing moms at the emergency room and left. Natalie and Naomie ...Or theyre told to drive themselves in and theres usually a we dont want them to know were involved, which is a problem because now you have no history to go with them, he said. Every obstetrician has anecdotal stories of all kinds of things. Births at home are usually attended by certified nurse midwives, certified professional midwives or doulas. CPMs dont have to have any formal education, although they must be certified by the North American Registry of Midwives. Doulas dont need formal education either, but can get voluntary training and certification.CNMs, on the other hand, must have nursing degrees. Theres a lot of disagreement on which type of birth is safer. One study in Oregon, which has the nations highest rate of home births, showed that the perinatal mortality for out-of-hospital births was about twice as high as the hospital average. But American women giving birth in hospitals are more likely to undergo cesarean sections, which come with risks such as infection and blood loss. According to study published in JAMA in 2015, cesarean delivery rates of up to about 19 percent are associated with lower maternal and infant deaths. The U.S. rate that year was 32 percent. Natalie Mothers-to-be weigh safety considerations while also considering the quality of the birth experience. Jessica Bevans, who has three daughters, has been through it all. Her first child was born at a birthing clinic, the second at Boone Hospital Center and the third at home. I decided to be home because I wanted to be able to focus on the pain and be able to relax through the pain, Bevans said. O'Fallon Birthing CenterI guess I just learned things from midwives more than I did in the hospital. They were definitely more educationallike caring about you and yourwell being and making sure you know that everything is OK and safe. Whereas, compared to the hospital, it was just kind of like procedurelike a medical procedurewhere I feel like (giving) birth is not a medical procedure. But I wasnt high-risk, and if I was high-risk, I probably would have chose a hospital. Insurance companies generally side with hospitals when it comes to safety. Aetnas policy says planned deliveries at home and associated services are not medically appropriate. It references the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, which says midwifery presents hazards to both mom and child. The majority of my clients come to me and they need that happy medium, Givens said. I do home births and hospital births, and the ones that choose the hospital birth but still want to go the more natural route are doing so because of insurance purposes and finances. Indian Midwife explains birthing to a would be motherBirth and economics in India In India, home births can be especially dangerous. Thats because so many happen among poor women in rural areas who lack access to care and rely on untrained midwives during delivery. A 2010 study by the Harvard School of Public Health showed 150,000 deaths in India could have been prevented by 2015 if women had better access to care during their pregnancies and deliveries. Vidhi Beri, a lactation specialist and child nutrition counselor in India, said traditional midwives get informal training handed down through generations, but arent updated about advancements in birthing techniques. In a small village in central India in the Hoshangabad district in Madhya Pradesh, midwifery is a tradition for Sima Kumari,70, whose mother and grandmother were also midwives. She took government classes training her in natural treatment, hygiene and health, and accompanied her mother as she worked. She said the process can sometimes be risky if the pregnancy is complicated and she has to take the mom to a hospital. In majority times the patient dies while travelling, before even reaching the hospital because the hospitals are very far from the villages, she said. Samir Chakraborty, a gynecologist from Kolkata, India, said midwives lack of specialization makes home births unsafe. Any medical complications can be deadly. The risks are much different for Indian women higher on the income scale. Women among Indias growing middle class are getting more C-sections these days -- and facing the complications that come along with them. Indian health officials claim this is partly because of pressure from doctors at private hospitals, which are paid more for surgical procedures. Women who may not know much about the risks of C-sections tend to take their doctors advice. But wealthier, more educated women in India are starting to push for more natural deliveries -- both in the hospital and, increasingly, at home. And those home births benefit from well-trained and paid helpers unavailable to the poor. Ultimately, theres no clear answer as to the best place to give birth. But mothers and health workers in both India and the United States agree that women should ideally be able to choose-- and get all the support they need to deliver healthy babies. When everything goes right, Givens said, the experience of pregnancy and childbirth can be amazing for mothers. Its unbelievable to see the body change and grow and blossom, and then all this power be put forth into having this new life. (Additional contribution and Multimedia by Rachel Thomas) India Blooms New Service-Trans World Features (IBNS-TWF) (A University of Missouri and IBNS-TWF Collaboration Series Article) Traditional Indian music fills a two-room yoga studio. Dozens of colored mats rest on the floor, facing a shrine. On the wall is a framed picture of Tirumalai Krishnamacharya, the father of modern yoga, near a statue of the Hindu god Ganesh. In USAs Midwestern town of Columbia, Missouri, the teacher at AlleyCat Yoga calls out positions tree pose, child pose, warrior pose as students bend their bodies in rhythmic motions to quiet their frazzled minds.Class ends with a final unison, Namaste. More than 8,000 miles away, a handful of men and women roll out mats inside the Mystic Yoga Cafe in Kolkata, India. Here, the room resembles a dance studio, with simple decor and full-length mirrors covering the front wall. There is no music, no special chanting. Stifling temperatures above 100 degrees dont deter participants, who attend mostly for fitness or weight loss. Melinda Oliver, of St. Louis, USA, practices yoga at Lake Stephens Park in Columbia, MO. Oliver in a senior at the University of Missouri and has been practicing yoga for two years. Oliver teaches community classes in Columbia, Missouri. She also began a program teaching yoga to 9th-grade girls to promote self-awareness, self-esteem and mental health.These disparate scenes may be the opposite of what many expect. While yogis in the United States are increasingly reconnecting with yogas spiritual roots, many in India are influenced by Americas commercialized approach to the practice and are becoming more consumer-focused themselves. Yoga reflects a reality of globalization the exchange of ideas that shapes cultures across our connected world, now more than ever. Such exchanges help drive a booming yoga industry. More than 36 million U.S. practitioners spent $2.5 billion on yoga classes in 2016, according to the Yoga in America Study conducted by Yoga Journal and Yoga Alliance. In the St. Louis metro area alone, there are nearly 50 yoga studios offering classes of all kinds. In India, the number of yoga practitioners soared 30 percent last year, prompting a 35 percent increase in demand for yoga trainers catering to Westernized natives and international tourists, according to the Associated Chambers of Commerce & Industry of India. A group of Indian men and women strike yoga poses while being led during a class at Mystic Yoga Cafe in Kolkata.East meets West The historical origins of yoga are steeped in ancient Indian philosophy designed to cultivate greater self-awareness, higher levels of consciousness and inner peace. Yoga gained popularity in America in the 1960s, when the Beatles used traditional Indian instruments on their album Help! stoking interest in Eastern culture among Westerners. Over the next several decades, yoga spread across the United States, gaining an American flavor along the way. By the 1980s and 90s, the practice was more consumer-focused than traditional Indian yoga. Americans increasingly used it as an exercise to stay healthy and active, according to the Yoga in America Study. In 2016, the study reported that Americans spent $16 billion on yoga classes, clothing and accessories. Businesses profited from consumers interest in yoga perhaps none more so than yoga retail giant Lululemon, which charges up to $128 for a pair of yoga pants. A group of Indian men and women strike yoga poses while being led during a class at Mystic Yoga Cafe in Kolkata.Some yoga instructors say this consumerism can be a good thing. Do I like looking cute in my yoga pants? You bet. Do we capitalize on that? Yes, we live in America, said Kathy Kessler, a yoga teacher at Halcyon Spa & Salon in Augusta. But because its become commercialized, so many people were exposed to it that werent before. If someone comes to the mat, theyre going to evolve and and understand the therapeutic benefits of it. Yearning for meaning Yet many U.S. yoga practitioners are looking to the past to recapture that centuries-old spirituality at the core of the practice. One huge aspect of yoga is breathing and meditating, and I do that as much as possible throughout my week, said University of Missouri senior Lucille Sherman, who has been practicing yoga since childhood. Yoga helps me center myself. I'm a better person when I practice. It reminds me to sit still and take in life as it is, just for a moment. A group of Indian men and women strike yoga poses while being led during a class at Mystic Yoga Cafe in Kolkata.Types of yoga that reconnect Americans with the deeper side of practice are gaining momentum. These include Kundalini, which blends physical and spiritual practices like dynamic breathing and mantra chantingto awaken the conscious. Kessler offers Kundalini, as well as gong healing and other more spiritual classes. (Kundalini) is much more spiritual than what has happened to yoga as its been mainstreamed, said SiriAtmaKaur, a Kundalini teacher at Urban Breath Yoga in St. Louis. Its 16 times as powerful as other forms of yoga in getting into upper states of consciousness and achieving balance. The formulas are so powerful, you radiate. You look different. Instead of trendy yoga pants embellished with bright colors and bold patterns, Kaur said Kundalini practitioners opt for plain white clothing made of cotton, wool or silk to brighten their aura and prevent static electricity from altering their personal electric charges. The attire is topped with a headscarf to keep the Kundalini energy, awakened during yoga, from escaping through the top of the head. Thanks to pop star practitioners like Katy Perrys ex-husband, Russell Brand, Kundalini communities are active on the U.S. coasts. Recruiting members in St. Louis is tougher, but any American looking to reconnect with yogas traditional roots can find several tools in Kundalini practice, Kaur said. One such tool is the ringing of the disharmonious gong, which helps students reset and balance their minds. Another is the Japji, or the Song of the Soul recited by the ancient sikhs that allows yogis to explore the depths of their souls. The poses themselves are tools to explore the inner self. You can just do the yoga, but most of the time, people catch Kundalini, and they want to go all the way because it makes such a difference, Kaur said. Its not a religion, but a lifestyle, a technology, a sacred science. West meets East Sudeshna Sen, a 24-year-old student at St. Xavieras College in Maidan, Kolkata, practices yoga in front of the Victoria Memorial. Sen has been practicing yoga for three years and attends weekend classes at Power Yoga in Kolkata.While spirituality takes hold in the United States, Indias yoga scene is shifting to accommodate American consumer needs. More stressed-out Americans are traveling to India on yoga retreats, helping the Asian giant become one of the fastest-growing wellness tourism destinations in the booming $439 billion worldwideindustry, according to the Global Wellness Institute. Missouri resident Dustin Thomas, who suffers from a connective tissue disorder called Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, made the pilgrimage to Pune, India, for rest, relaxation and a chance to learn how to become a yoga trainer at his business,Yoga Studio 72, in Springfield. I live basically pain free now, Thomas said. Yoga is the only thing Ive found that can manage the pain or get rid of it. The Indian government is capitalizing on yogas popularity by supporting global events like the United Nations International Day of Yoga that make the practice even more susceptible to global and commercial forces. Such events boost Indias international profile and help the country export other parts of its culture, such as films, food and fashion. I am in touch with a friend in France, and I must say, she does yoga way better than any Indian trainer, said 40-year-old GauravPandey, who attends classes at Mystic Yoga Cafe. I practice yoga as it is a great way to keep myself healthy and fit without using any equipment. It is more of an exercise for me. But not everyone is happy with yogas changing profile in India. Pandering to commercial interests has caused tension among traditional yoga teachers, who believe globalization has inadvertently corrupted yogas original purpose. Sudeshna Sen, a 24-year-old student at St. Xavieras College in Maidan, Kolkata, practices yoga in front of the Victoria Memorial. Sen has been practicing yoga for three years and attends weekend classes at Power Yoga in Kolkata.Indians have more knowledge about yoga as it originated in India, so it is our duty to see that yoga is practiced in its purest form, said Sudhir Maheshwari, a yoga trainer at Mystic Yoga Cafe in the eastern city of Kolkata. In India, the practice of yoga must be kept traditional. Once the Western influences creep in, the original form of yoga is not practiced in its sacred form. Though globalization has produced profound changes in yoga, some practitioners say its spiritual essence is its greatest gift to the world and the reason its spreading, as Maheshwari said, like wildfire. I feel if anything is mystical, it will be practiced and adopted by people, the trainer said. When people feel and see the change, they will automatically adopt it. (Images by Avishek Mitra in India and Emma Beyer in USA) The Fortnight on Elimination of Violence Against Women, mandated by a UN declaration, begins on 25 November and ends on International Human Rights Day, 10 December. Violence against women still continues worldwide, including India, but women are also fighting back, reportsi Aninnya Sarkar When I was almost beaten to death, my broken ribs fought back, recalls Kaveri, 27, who now lives on a footpath of Kolkata. Twelve years back when she was 15, her parents forcefully got her married. The physical violence by her husband started almost immediately because she couldnt meet her in-laws dowry demands. Every night was a repetition. I was beaten with leather belts, my head was banged against the wall, Kaveri says. One day she was attacked with an iron rod and thrown out of the house. Her neighbours took her to a local government hospital. After recovering, she went to her parents place but they refused to let her live with them and advised her to return to her marital home. Rather than returning to the hell hole, Kaveri chose the footpaths of the Central Avenue. To earn a living, she now works in a small tea stall. There are hundreds of Kaveris in India - tortured, killed ,and even driven to committing suicide. But they are fighting back too, struggling for justice. According to the National Family and Health Survey 3 (2005-06) , the rate of domestic violence in India was 37.2%. According to the recently published National and Family Health Survey 4 (2015-16) , the rate of domestic violence for married woman is 28.8% and for women who have experienced violence during pregnancy is 3.3%. In the patriarchal social system, the assumed male superiority and female inferiority is the well canvassed binary that is internalised within the family system. As a result, the master- slave dialectic operates as a normative practice within the traditional households where women are always accepted as physically weak, economically dependent and a reproductive slave, says Sanjukta Dasgupta, professor of English, Calcutta University. The violence is not confined to the poor and uneducated section of society alone. Sikha Talapatra, a Ph.D enrolled scholar and lecturer at Kalyani University, West Bengal, came to work one day with a blue scar on her forehead. After concerned enquiry by her colleagues, Sikha admitted that she was a victim of marital rape. I am constantly in war with my spouse and facing violence. He wants me to leave the job and settle down as a home maker. But I wont lose my independence, even if I have to divorce him, Shikha says emphatically. Indian law, however, has moved with the times to come to the rescue of hapless women. Earlier, in the pro-male dominated society there were no rights to give relief for domestic violence. Now things are changing, people are much more educated and these cases are brought to light by filing an application to the court under Section 498A, says Gitanath Ganguly, an executive chairman of Legal Aid Matters. Explains Biswajit Thakurta, a Public Prosecutor in Kolkata: According to the rules of Supreme Court, under Section 498(A), there are two types of violence recognised- mental cruelty and physical cruelty- so if a woman faces any such kind of violence in her household, she can immediately go and report to the local police station, the officer in-charge is supposed to file the complaint by doing a thorough investigation of the case. Sadly, domestic violence is not restricted to male members alone. It may extend to other female members of the household as well. Neelam Singh, a nurse from Kolkata Medical College and Hospital talks about an injured pregnant woman who was accompanied by her mother in law. Her face was covered and she was bleeding heavily. When we asked her what happened, her mother-in-law said that she fell down from the stairs. But when we took the patient inside for private examination, she burst out, What stairs? She has beaten me and now have come to the hospital to check whether the baby is ok or not. Ironically, a report in the National Family Health Survey 3 finds that a higher proportion of women compared to men finds wife beating as justifiable. Thus, more than the husband or the father-in-law of the family, the mother-in-laws hostility also leads to violence. Swayam, an NGO in Kolkata which extends legal advice to women finds that though Section 498A is a critical tool many victims say that it is not always foolproof to get justice. Abida Begum, a domestic violence survivor shares how her husband used to torture her psychologically by threatening her, using verbal abuses to her because she was unable to bring a male-child to the family. But when she went to lodge a complaint at the police station, they refused to note down the report as she failed to show any mark of injury to prove that she was a victim. But, Thakurta informs, In case the officer- in-charge of the local police station refuses to write the report , the victim can file a complaint with the Deputy Commissioner of Police or the Superintendent of the police. Not being very familiar with the procedure women face other problems, says Gargi Guha, director, Support Service coordinator at Swayam. These days we often hear comments that Section 498A is misused. But my experience of working with the survivors in the last 22 years is that when a survivor approaches the lawyer to take up her case, he or she doesnt explain explicitly the disparity between a civil case and a criminal case, and the benefits they are going to get from it. Additionally, To make the case stronger and presentable, the lawyers often compel their clients to include statements that are at times fake or might have not happened in reality. so when the victim is put in the trial court and the defense lawyer cross examines her on the basis of the FIR report, the woman feels nervous and the case becomes complicated or the accusation becomes false sometimes. Another dark side of the patriarchal society is how violence often extends to children. When the father abuses the mother in front of the children, they take this as a practice and instead of sympathising with the mother, they also maltreat her. Swati Burman, a survivor shares how after suffering brutality in the hands of her husband, she faced the same kind of cruelty from her son . I had hoped that when my son grew up, he would support me but since I had no money and couldnt to give him any, he took his fathers side and both of them beat me up often. Swati gave up hope of ever having a peaceful home and started living alone by setting up her own parlour and slowly built a life on her own. Its quite pathetic to walk out with almost nothing in hand. But it can be done. Because you are walking out with freedom to find your own self, says Swati. Gender sensitisation combined with information on their legal rights can help women looking for justice in a long way. Educational institutions and work places are ideal areas to conduct workshops on this subject. Many schools for girls have now introduced courses on self-defence which is positive step too. (Some names have been changed to protect privacy) Image: A still from the Deepa Mehta film Heaven on Earth in which a young Indian Punjabi woman who finds herself in an abusive arranged marriage Other Images: UN Photo / Gender Violence Posters On October 30, 2017, the three-day debate on the Interim Report of the Steering Committee set up under the Constitutional Assembly (CA) began in Parliament. The debate was supposed to conclude on November 1. However, due to demands from a large number of Members of Parliament (MPs) for additional time to express their views, Chairman of the CA, Speaker Karu Jayasuriya decided on November 2, 2017, to continue the debate on November 2 and November 8. The Interim Report was submitted to the CA by Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe as Chairman of the Steering Committee on September 21, 2017, stressing that Sri Lanka should remain one undivided and indivisible country, where maximum devolution should be granted, but argued for the inclusion of specific provisions in the Constitution to prevent secession (division of the country). The report proposed that provincial councils would be the primary unit of devolution, while local bodies had been named as the implementing agency of both the central Government and the provincial councils. Issuing a statement following the submission of the Interim Report, R. Sampanthan, Leader of the Opposition and of the main Tamil party, the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), stated, on September 21, 2017, "The successful conclusion of this Constitution-making process on the basis of an acceptable, reasonable and substantial national consensus would bring about a firm finality to this issue. Sri Lanka would perpetually be a united undivided and indivisible country in keeping with the basic and Supreme Law of the country, and on the basis of the free will and consent of its entire people." However, the Joint Opposition has expressed itself against the new Constitution. On July 7, 2016, the Joint Opposition had announced its 'Shadow Cabinet' in which former President Mahinda Rajapaksa was appointed shadow Prime Minister. On January 27, 2017, while addressing a public rally in Colombo, Rajapaksa accused President Maithripala Sirisena of trying to appease the minority Tamil community by promising devolution of power, saying he would oppose the "fraudulent" new Constitution. Further, on October 26, 2017, the Joint Opposition's constitutional expert, Professor G.L Peiris declared that the Government did not have a mandate for a new Constitution, and that the Joint Opposition opposed the Interim Report submitted to Parliament on the new Constitution. Of late, the Joint Opposition group has been divided over the Constitution-making process, with one group insisting on immediate withdrawal from the CA and the other adamant on remaining in it. Surprisingly, Joint Opposition leader Rajapaksa, participating in the CA debate on the Interim Report on November 2, 2017, expressed hope that the new Constitution would promote national and religious unity. Rajapaksa stated that he was participating in the legislative process to formulate a new Constitution with the sincere hope of creating unity in the country and enjoined leaders not to create hate among communities. As a result, expressing optimism, Minister of Finance Mangala Samaraweera, participating the debate in Parliament on October 31, 2017, observed, "By formulating a new Constitution the trajectory of the country can be changed towards a new direction and create an 'equal citizenship' to bring about economic prosperity." Meanwhile, Prime Minister Wickremesinghe speaking in the debate on November 1, 2017, insisted that the Government cannot do anything without the agreement of all parties. The Premier called upon everyone to be united to introduce the new Constitution. Significantly, in another step forward in Sri Lanka's path to sustained peace, and paving the way to set up an office to trace around 20,000 people still missing eight years after the end of the nearly three-decade-long civil war, President Sirisena on July 20, 2017, signed the Office on Missing Persons (OMP) Act. Further, on September 12, 2017, President Sirisena signed the Gazette Notification to operationalize the OMP Act from September 15. Accordingly, on October 24, 2017, the Government called for applications to appoint members to the OMP. Applications have been called from persons with previous experience in in fact finding or investigation, human rights law, international humanitarian law, humanitarian response, or who possess other qualifications relevant to carrying out the functions of the OMP. The applications, along with the curriculum vitae, were to reach the Acting Secretary General of the Constitutional Council, Parliament of Sri Lanka, Sri Jayewardenepura Kotte, on or before November 6, 2017. The bill to establish the OMP was introduced on May 22 2016, and on June 21, 2017, the bill was passed unanimously in Parliament. Regarding the devolution of power, Prime Minister Wickremesinghe, on July 27, 2017, declared that it was difficult to go back to a pre-1972 system, as the parties had committed themselves to maximum devolution of power, unlike those days where Government Agents represented the state at the village level. Meanwhile, on October 21, 2017, President Sirisena observed that the devolution of power should not be carried out in the interest of politicians but it should be dedicated to strengthening the people and fulfilling their needs. The aim of decentralization of power, he emphasized, was to equally hand over the benefits of development to each citizen and to create an environment for each person to live in a just society. Devolution of power should never divide or separate the country, the President added. Meanwhile, reassuring that the Tamil minority community's demand for a federal solution to meet its political aspirations was not aimed at dividing the country, Northern Province Chief Minister C.V. Wigneswaran stated on September 9, 2017, "You [the Sinhalese] think we [Tamils] are all terrorists. We do not want to divide this country. When we ask for federalism we are being accused of trying to divide the country. The Tamils want the distinct identity recognized by the majority Sinhalese." Likewise, on October 4, 2017, Opposition Leader Sampanthan stressed that that the majority Sinhala communities need not to be afraid of the Tamils, as there would be constitutional protection preventing any move towards separation. The power-sharing arrangements would be worked out within a United, Undivided and Indivisible Sri Lanka. Another Tamil demand was the release of prisoners detained under the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) without any court cases. Around 132 Tamil prisoners are known to be in custody, including both those awaiting trial for several years (ranging from 8 to 24 years) or serving sentences. Disturbingly, a Hartal (General Strike) campaign was launched by the business community and Tamil civil organizations in the Northern Province on October 13, 2017, demanding the release of Tamil prisoners. All traders in the Northern Province closed their shops to support the Hartal. Education activities in all Tamil schools in the North were crippled and all transport services came to a halt. Further, moving an adjournment motion in Parliament on October 17, 2017, Opposition Leader R. Sampanthan urged the Government to release all persons held in custody under PTA, from the North and East, without further delay. Once again, Sampnanthan told Parliament on November 1, 2017, that things would get worse for Sri Lanka, especially in the international arena if the country failed to address the 'national question'. Separately, the international continues to leverage the human rights platform to pressurize Colombo, expressing disappointment in Sri Lanka's progress in achieving the key goals set out in the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) Resolution adopted in October 2015. UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Counter-Terrorism, Ben Emmerson observed on July 14, 2017, "None of the measures so far adopted to fulfill Sri Lanka's transitional justice commitments are adequate to ensure real progress, and there is little evidence that perpetrators of war crimes committed by members of the Sri Lankan armed forces are being brought to justice." Similarly, International Crisis Group in a report released on July 28, 2017, said that eight years after the end of Sri Lanka's armed conflict, the promises by the Government to the UNHRC in 2015 have failed to materialize and the urgent economic and psychosocial needs of all conflict-affected groups remain unmet. Moreover, at the 36th session of the UNHRC in Geneva on September 11, 2017, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein urged the Sri Lankan Government to accelerate the pace of fulfilling the UNHRC resolution adopted in October 2015. Similarly, Human Rights Watch (HRW) calling on UN member countries to press Sri Lanka to promptly meet the targets of the UNHRC's October 2015 resolution for transitional justice, stated on September 14, 2017, "Governments at the Human Rights Council should be clear with Sri Lanka that setting up various reconciliation offices and talking of progress is not the same as implementing the 2015 resolution. Long-suffering Sri Lankans need to see the resolution fully carried out, and they need to see evidence that justice is being achieved." Meanwhile, demonstrating the Government's commitment, Minister of Prison Reforms, Resettlement and Rehabilitation D. M. Swaminathan noted, on September 18, 2017, that the Attorney General's Department would take steps to expedite the cases of those arrested under PTA. The Minister confirmed that steps were being taken to deal with cases filed under PTA. More significantly, at the concluding ceremony of the Nila Mehewara - President's People Service - National Programme 2017 held at Saivapragasa Ladies' College in Vavuniya District, President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe visited Vavuniya District in the North on October 21, 2017, in an effort to resolve the problems of the public. At the event, the President symbolically handed over 5000, land deeds to the people of the North. The Nila Mehewara - President's People Service - National Programme 2017 was launched in Vavuniya in March. For over seven months Ministers and Secretaries have visited Vavuniya from time to time under the program to provide solutions to the unresolved problems of the people. On November 1, 2017, Prime Minister Wickremesinghe launched the five-yearNational Action Plan for the Protection and Promotion of Human Rights at a ceremony held at the Parliament Complex. Speaking at the event, the Prime Minister declared the time had come to reaffirm human rights in the country. The National Action Plan for the Protection and Promotion of Human Rights 2017-2021 documents goal-oriented activities in Human Rights arena, aimed to strengthen national processes and mechanisms for the protection and promotion of human rights through substantial constitutional, legislative, policy and administrative frameworks. Earlier, on May 26, 2016, Sri Lanka expanded its commitment to human rights by ratifying theInternational Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities The National Unity Government (NUG) has made remarkable efforts to press forward the reconciliation process by reaching out to the Tamils and initiating constitutional and legal reforms. It has furthered the much-awaited Constitution-making process by debating the Interim Report of the CA Steering Committee in Parliament. However, as some leaders of the Joint Opposition continue to oppose the Interim Report, the process is yet to be completed, and Sri Lanka's journey to achieve development targets and the reconciliation process remain unfinished. Image: Wikimedia Commons On October 22, 2017, the dead body of a civilian, identified as Sama Pangi (45), was recovered from Spillway Ghat (bank of a water body) of Balimela reservoir in the Chitrakonda area of Malkangiri District in Odisha. On October 15, 2017, Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) cadres had hijacked a motor launch boat and taken Sama Pangi, its driver, hostage in the "cut-off" region of Chitrakonda in the District, when the vessel was on its way to Kunturpadar carrying grocery items for Indian Reserve Battalion (IRB) forces deployed in the region. The Maoists killed Pangi suspecting him to be a 'Police informer'. According to Police, Pangi had been attacked two years earlier as well, but had survived. Following the attack, he had left his native village Janti and was staying at Pilobai village in the Chitrakonda area. He had sought protection from the District Police. On October 6, 2017, CPI-Maoist cadres shot Dambaru Nayak (40) dead at Kurub village under Kalimela Police limits in Malkangiri District. According to reports, nearly 20 to 25 armed Maoists had come to the village and dragged Dambaru out of his home. They held a Jan Adalat (People's/ Kangaroo Court organized by the Maoists) where they accused him of being a 'Police informer' and shot him dead in the presence of the villagers. On October 5, 2017, CPI-Maoist cadres killed a villager, identified as Imra Kabasi, in the Bapanapalli area under Padia Police limits in Malkangiri District. The Maoists dragged Imra to the nearby forest and slit his throat. The Maoists suspected that Imra was a 'Police informer'. According to partial data collated by the South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), at least nine civilians have been killed in Malkangiri District in Left Wing Extremism (LWE)-linked violence in 2017 (data till November 5, 2017). Significantly, out of five Districts across Odisha from where such civilian fatalities have been recorded in the current year, Malkangiri has the dubious distinction of being the front-runner, with Kalahandi and Koraput both standing distant seconds, with two fatalities each. Kandhamal and Rayagada have recorded one such fatality each. The total number of civilian killings in such violence across Odisha in the current year stands at 15. Out of 31 Districts across seven States from where Maoist-linked civilian fatalities have been recorded in the current year, Malkangiri was the worst, with nine fatalities; followed by Jamui (Bihar) and Gumla (Jharkhand), with five fatalities each. Since the formation of the CPI-Maoist on September 21, 2004, Malkangiri has recorded at least 116 civilian fatalities and is ranked 1st among a total of 18 Districts in Odisha from where civilian fatalities have been registered over this period. In terms of all-India data, out of 116 Districts from where civilian fatalities have been recorded since the formation of CPI-Maoist, Malkangiri ranked 6th. The Districts which recorded a greater number of civilian fatalities included West Midnapore (West Bengal), 464; Dantewada (Chhattisgarh), 337; Bijapur (Chhattisgarh), 174; Gadchiroli (Maharashtra), 153; and Gumla (Jharkhand), 121. After registering a significant dip in civilian fatalities, on year on year basis, in 2016, the surge witnessed in the current year is worrying. The escalation may primarily be due to declining engagement with Security Forces (SFs) on the ground, as is evident from the data: just one Maoist killed in the current year as against 31 Maoists killed in the corresponding period of 2016, the highest Maoist fatalities in the District since the formation of CPI-Maoist. Civilian targeting is a low risk effort to restore a measure of dominance in areas where the Maoists have suffered major reverses, and to inflict penalties on those who are perceived as aiding the State's operational successes. Indeed, since the two successive encounters in the Bejingi Forest area between Ramgarh and Panasput in the Malkangiri District on October 24 and 27, 2016, the Maoists have been struggling to retain their hold in the District. Since September 21, 2004, Malkangiri District has recorded 86 SF fatalities, as compared to 85 fatalities among the Maoists, establishing a kill ratio of 1:1.01 in favour of the Maoists. Out of 69 Districts across 14 States of India from where fatalities in both these categories were recorded, the kill ratio has been in favour of the Maoists in just 25 Districts. Significantly, the kill ratio has veered sharply in favour of the SFs since 2013. Located in the southern part of the State, Malkangiri also shares its borders with Sukma District (carved out of Dantewada) in Chhattisgarh; Khammam District in Telangana; and East Godavari and Vishakhapatnam Districts in Andhra Pradesh. The District population is 613,192 (Census 2011), and it occupies an area of 5,791 square kilometers. 2,321 square kilometres of its total geographical area, about 40.08 per cent, is under forest cover. Terrain and geographical proximity to contiguous Maoist-affected regions in neighbouring States (Chhattisgarh, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh), have made Malkangiri a perfect area for a guerrilla stronghold. Significantly, the Maoist diktat runs across the District, despite their progressive loss of geographical control in Malkangiri. Disruptive dominance is maintained through the creation of an atmosphere of terror in the region through the targeted killing of civilians, as well as other acts of intimidation. On September 18, 2017, the Maoists forced a family from Paparmetla Palem village in Malkangiri District to leave their village. Ten members of the family of Kamal Khila were forced out, as the Maoists had branded their son, who was working outside the State, a Police Informer. Earlier, on September 17, 2017, a youth, Pilku Khara, belonging to Luchapani village in the Chitrakonda Block of the District, fled home after a Maoist kangaroo court held on September 9 told him to join their organisation or face 'punishment'. Further, around 20 armed CPI-Maoist cadres had barged into Murelguda village under Chitrakonda block on September 14, 2017, in search of their 'convict' Ramachandra Sisa, who had been 'awarded death sentence', by a kangaroo court on September 9, 2017, for defying the Maoists. As the Maoists failed to extract any information about Sisa, they set his two-wheeler on fire. They also terrorised the villagers while enquiring about Sisa, who is reportedly running for his life after he escaped from the kangaroo court. Sources indicate that he has moved to an undisclosed location along with his wife, leaving behind his frail mother to fend for herself in the village. Similarly, on September 1, 2017, a family in the Jantri village in the Chitrakonda Block had to leave their home after the Maoists threatened them. Meanwhile, on October 15, 2017, CPI-Maoist posters and letters were found at Badatekguda under the Kalimela Block of the District, in which the rebels demanded that at least 10 people from each village of Malkangiri District must join the Maoists at the Helkanur Hill on October 25, 2017. A violation of the 'order', the Maoists warned, would attract the 'death sentence'. No further information is available about the incident. In the same letter, the Maoists had asked surrendered cadres to return to the outfit, else they would 'not be spared'. Apart from the increased civilian fatalities in Malkangiri, other patterns of violence in the District have also seen a rise. A total of 15 persons were abducted in four incidents in 2017 (till November 5), while there was no such incident in the corresponding period of 2016. The Maoists have carried out three incidents of arson in 2017, as against none in the corresponding period of previous year. Further, at least 11 families have deserted their homes in 2017 due to Maoist threats, as against seven families in the corresponding period of 2016. On October 26, 2017, the State Government decided to intensify its drive against the CPI-Maoist, with a focus on joint operations by Police and Central Forces in Malkangiri and Koraput Districts, which were considered to be Maoist strongholds. On October 26, 2017, during his first visit to Malkangiri and Koraput, State Director General of Police (DGP), R.P. Sharma, since taking charge as the State Police Chief on August 31, 2017, reviewed anti-Maoist operations and stated, "Our emphasis will be on joint operations and better co-ordination between the forces." DGP Sharma, also reviewed the ongoing work on the Gurupriya Bridge, which would connect the six Gram Panchayats (village level local-self government institutions) in the "cut-off" area located across the Balimela reservoir, with the District's mainland. Earlier, on September 28, 2017, Border Security Force (BSF) Additional Director General (ADG), Arun Kumar, had informed, We are planning to fill security gaps in the cutoff areas of Malkangiri and Tulsi Dongri of Chhattisgarh to cause maximum damage to the Red rebels. Accordingly, we are planning operations in those particular areas. Communications in the cutoff areas is a major problem. Recently, the Central Government has allotted Rs 25 crore for upgradation of infrastructure in these areas. This has boosted the morale of the forces.. The Maoists persist in their effort to retain a hold in Malkangiri, and the security challenge refuses to die. Time bound efforts - both from the Centre and State - are quintessential for the District to consolidate the tremendous gains that the SFs have secured, and to ensure that the Maoists find no remaining place to hide, despite the difficulties of terrain and location that have long favoured them. Image: Wikimedia Commons New Delhi, Nov 8 (IBNS): Union Minister of State (IC) for Power and New & Renewable Energy Raj Kumar Singh led the Indian delegation in the International Energy Agency (IEA) Ministerial, being held in Paris. The Minister emphasised the importance of clean energy and assured achievement of 175GW of renewable target of India while addressing the Plenary Session on Driving the Transitions to Clean Energy. At the Ministerial, India signed joint work programmes with IEA and other key members of the IEA Family i.e. Brazil, Chile, India, Indonesia and Thailand. The event focusses on energy security, clean energy technology and government-industry dialogue on investment and digitalization, which would provide major opportunities for efficiency gains in the energy sector in the future, read a government statement. On the side-lines of the IEA Ministerial, the Minister had a delegate level discussion with the French Minister of State for Ecological and Inclusive Transition, Brune Poirson. Shri Singh also had a very fruitful discussion on various issues of Power and New & Renewable Energy with the US Secretary of Energy, James Richard Perry. New Delhi, Nov 8 (IBNS): Owing to the severe air pollution in the national capital, the Union Health Ministry has issued a health advisory and has urged people to follow the same. In the advisory, the ministry has recommended those with breathing difficulty to remain indoors. Parents have been asked to keep children indoors as much as possible. Delhiites have been advised to avoid morning walks or any other strenuous outdoor activity that increases breathing rate. The advisory has suggested all to drink plenty of water and fluids; avoid smoking; minimize the use of deodorants and room sprays as much as possible; and to avoid the areas with smoke or heavy dust. For those with heart ailments and chronic respiratory disease or asthma, the ministry has recommended them to continue their medication as advised by physician. "In case of any difficulty in breathing, increase in breathing rate, palpitations or severe bout of coughing and/or sneezing consult for medical assistance," the advisory stated. Earlier in the day, Delhi's Education Minister Manish Sisodia ordered all the schools in Delhi to remain closed till Sunday as a huge blanket of poisonous smog covered the national capital for the second consecutive day. All schools remained closed on Wednesday as a result of an earlier order on Tuesday. "The condition of air in Delhi is getting worse. We cannot compromise on children's health in such a condition. I have asked all schools to remain closed till Sunday," Sisodia tweeted in Hindi. The Government's decision followed a tweet by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday, in which he called the city a "gas chamber" and asked Sisodia to consider shutting the schools for a few days. "Delhi has become a gas chamber. Every year this happens during this part of year. We have to find a solution to crop burning in adjoining states," Kejriwal had tweeted Delhi and its adjoining suburbs remained enveloped by the smog on Wednesday morning as well, forcing visibility to dip to 300 meters at some places, causing train delays and slowing down flight operations. The Delhi Government has also issued a health advisory for high risk people, including children, the elderly, pregnant women and those suffering from asthma and heart ailments against venturing outdoors in particular times. On October 21, 2017, 40 Islamic State (IS, formerly, Islamic State of Iraq and al Sham, also Daesh) terrorists, including two trainers and 38 suicide bombers, were killed in a deadly United States (US) airstrike targeting a training camp for the suicide bombers in the Achin District of eastern Nangarhar Province. Police identified the two Daesh trainers killed in the attack as Qari Quran and Qari Fida. A significant cache of weapons, ammunition and explosives belonging to the terror group were also destroyed in the airstrike. On October 20, 2017, a key leader of Daesh identified as Abu Tahir Al-Bajawari and nine other terrorists were killed in a US drone strike in the Achin District of eastern Nangarhar Province. On October 18, 2017, 23 Daesh terrorists were killed in the airstrikes conducted by US Forces in the Nazian and Achin Districts of eastern Nangarhar Province. Weapons, ammunition, and explosives were also destroyed in the airstrikes. On October 12, 2017, five Taliban were killed in airstrikes in the Mirza Olang area of Sayad District in northern Sar-e-Pul Province. A local leader of the group identified as Mullah Syed Ahmad was among those killed. At least two Taliban were critically wounded in the airstrikes. On October 10, 2017, eight Taliban were killed and several others wounded in airstrikes in the Arghistan District of Badakhshan Province. Weapons, ammunition, and explosives were also destroyed in the airstrikes. On October 7, 2017, seven Taliban were killed and 11 were wounded in an airstrike targeting a Taliban compound in the Dara-e-Alf Safi area of northern Sar-e-Pul Province. On October 3, 2017, 11 Daesh terrorists were killed in airstrikes conducted by US Forces in the Achin District of eastern Nangarhar Province. Some weapons and ammunition were also destroyed in the airstrikes. According to partial data compiled by the South Asia Terrorism Portal (SATP), 974 terrorists have been killed across Afghanistan in the 61 days since the announcement of US President Donald Trump's new "South Asia strategy on August 22, 2017 (data till October 22, 2017). Crucially, the US has been conducting airstrikes on the Pakistan side as well. In the first US drone strike after the announcement of the new US strategy for Afghanistan and South Asia, three Afghan Taliban members were killed and another two were wounded on September 16, 2017, in an airstrike in the tribal regions of Kurram Agency in Pakistan, close to the Durand Line with Afghanistan. In the second air assault by US Forces, 20 terrorists were killed on October 16, 2017, in a series of deadly airstrikes targeting a compound of the Haqqani terrorist network in the Kurram Agency. Hours after the October 16 US airstrike, Pakistan's Foreign Minister Khawaja Asif called on the US to stop the airstrikes. Earlier, amid persistent US pressures on Pakistan regarding terrorist safe havens on its soil that are often blamed for major attacks in Afghanistan, Pakistan's Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi claimed on September 12, 2017, that Pakistan does not provide safe havens to terror groups. However, Afghan officials and US authorities have long insisted that the leadership councils of the Taliban and Haqqani terrorist networks are based in key cities of Pakistan, where they enjoy freedom of action. The US has also approved contracts worth billions for the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF). On August 28, 2017, the US Department of Defense awarded a contract worth around $727 million in support of the Afghan Air Force and Special Mission Wing in ongoing efforts to boost the ANDSF capabilities. On September 1, 2017, the US Department of Defense approved another contract for the Afghan Air Force worth $69.3 million, for contractual action for the Afghanistan Air Force AC-208 armed intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft requirements. On September 5, 2017, the US Department of Defense awarded a new contract for the Afghan Air Force worth more than $1.3 billion for procurement of an estimated quantity of 150 MD 530F aircraft and required production support services to include program management, delivery support, pilot training and maintenance. Significantly, on September 18, 2017, as part of a planned replacement of its ageing fleet of Russian-made Mi-17 helicopters, four US-made UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters were delivered to the Afghan Air Force. The US plans to supply a total of 159 Black Hawks to Afghanistan in the coming years to boost its capacity. The Afghan Air Force is considered one of the best-performing components of ANDSF. According to a July 2017 report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), a U.S. Congressional watchdog, 19 of the Afghan Air Force's 46-strong Mi-17 fleet were unusable because they were undergoing overhaul or repair. Reacting to the handover of the first batch of the UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters to the Afghan Air Force, Taliban group spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid declared, October 8, 2017, "US commander & Ashraf Ghani (the Afghan President) must remember that our fight is not based on technology but is an ideologically motivated fight. When Soviet and Communist government fell, they left hundreds of aircraft in airbases. US also tested hundreds of various aircraft here 16 years ago. Learn from history; your aircraft will strengthen us and shall work for our interests and goals just like your Humvee and Ford Ranger trucks." On July 11, 2017, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, asserted that Pakistan needs to stop interfering in Afghanistan's internal affairs and instead cooperate with the National Unity Government (NUG), and observed, "The factory of interference must be closed in Afghanistan. In establishing peace, at first we want peace with Pakistan; peace with the Taliban comes next." Pakistan, however, rejected the calls for the elimination of terror sanctuaries by Kabul and Washington with Pakistan's Chief of Army Staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa declaring, on September 7, 2017, "We cannot fight Afghanistan's war in Pakistan." The groups that have long been nurtured in Pakistan remain intact, despite growing international pressures. Significantly, on September 29, 2017, Pakistan's Foreign Minister Khawajah Asif admitted that terrorist groups and its leaders, including the Haqqanis had become 'liabilities' for Pakistan. Meanwhile, on September 19, 2017, speaking during the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York, President Ghani observed, "The Taliban and their backers cannot win militarily. Only through political settlement can we achieve enduring peace and I call upon all ranks of Taliban to engage in an intra-Afghan dialogue." Again, on October 8, 2017, President Ghani called on the Taliban groups to renounce violence and join the peace process, insisting that the option lies with the group. Notably, the sixth meeting of Quadrilateral Coordination Group (QCG) involving Afghanistan, Pakistan, China and the US was held at Muscat, Oman, on October 16, 2017. The Taliban failed to attend the QCG, as the peace process broke down after a fifth session in May 2016, when a US drone attack killed then Taliban Chief, Mullah Akhtar Mansoor, while he was traveling through the Pakistani Province of Balochistan. The aim of QCG was for members to use their respective influence on the Afghan Government and the Taliban to nudge them to the negotiating table. The insurgents' reluctance to engage in peace talks with the Afghan Government and Kabul's strained relations with Islamabad had also hampered previous QCG sessions from making any significant headway. The first meeting of the QCG had been held in Islamabad on January 11, 2016; the second in Kabul on January 18, 2016; the third in Islamabad on February 6, 2016; the fourth in Kabul on February 23, 2016; and the fifth in Islamabad, on May 18, 2016. Significantly, on an unannounced visit, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg and the US Defense Secretary James Mattis arrived in Kabul on September 27, 2017. Further, on October 18, 2017, the United States Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in his stark message to the Taliban group declared, "We'll be here as long as it takes until you change your mind." However, on October 7, 2017, the Taliban claimed that the group was not tired of war, and since it was the US-led invasion that toppled its regime, it called on the American Forces to withdraw from the country. The statement further added that the nation has neither become tired nor will become tired of the war, and that morale was high. It is difficult, at this early stage, to assess whether Trump's Afghan strategy will actually achieve its promised victory. Nevertheless, after years of accelerating withdrawals and phony declarations about ending combat operations, Trump's renewed commitment to stay the course, add additional resources, take the fight to the enemy, and end Pakistan's double game, represents a qualitative shift of potentially great importance. If implemented aggressively, adjusted as necessary, and sustained over time, there are improved chances that it may eventually get Afghanistan where needs to go. Canberra, Nov 1 (NITN): When you think of travelling to Australia, a few key spots to visit spring to mind: Bondi Beach, the Great Barrier Reef, and of course Uluru - which commonly was known for many years as Ayers Rock. Tourists come in droves to visit the grand scale of Uluru, the sandstone rock which is famous for its red glow. But according to the BBC, from October 2019 nobody will be allowed to climb the 348-metre-high natural structure. The landmark decision came after the board of the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park, where the rock is situated, voted unanimously against allowing tourists to scale it. The decision was made for a reason; Uluru is a sacred site for Aboriginal Australians, and to allow visitors to climb it has long been deemed disrespectful to the indigenous population. For a long time now, locals have requested that visitors don't climb up the site formally referred to as Ayers Rock, but this has consistently been ignored. That's despite signs being placed at the beginning of the climbing path urging tourists not to proceed. Speaking about the decision, Anangu Aboriginal man and chairman of the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park, Sammy Wilson said: "It is an extremely important place, not a playground or theme park like Disneyland. If I travel to another country and there is a sacred site, an area of restricted access, I don't enter or climb it, I respect it." So while the views might be beautiful, it's something visitors should know they don't have the right to access, and this new rule will enforce that for the benefit of the local indigenous people. Abu Dhabi, Nov 2 (IBNS): Etihad Airways has announced the suspension of one of its flight services to the United States -- Abu Dhabi-Dallas/Fort Worth (DFW) -- effective Mar 25, 2018, following American Airlines unilateral decision to terminate its codeshare agreement with the airline. Peter Baumgartner, Etihad Airways Chief Executive Officer, said: The unfortunate decision by American Airlines to terminate a commercial relationship that benefited both carriers has left Etihad with no choice but to suspend flights between our Abu Dhabi home and Dallas/Fort Worth. We are open to American Airlines reversing its decision to cancel our codeshare agreement so that Etihad Airways can continue the route and together protect and support American national interests and global connectivity while driving commercial value for both airlines. Etihad Airways had invested heavily in the DFW route since its launch in December 2014, the company said. The route commenced with three flights a week and was upgraded to a daily service in February 2017, providing travellers in the US and across the airlines network with access to more US cities through American Airlines primary hub. More than 235,000 travellers have flown on the route since its launch, according to a company released. Almost half of Etihad Airways DFW customers connect on US codeshare flights operated by American Airlines. Baumgartner added, The cancellation of the Dallas route is one of several adjustments that we are making to our US network in 2018 in order to improve system profitability. Further changes are possible as we monitor the full impact of the American Airlines codeshare cancellation on summer 2018 bookings. Etihad Airways is grateful to the state of Texas, its authorities, including the Mayors offices in Dallas and Fort Worth, DFW International Airport, local businesses, the travel trade, and the travelling public for their partnership throughout the years of our operation. According to independent research by Oxford Economics, in 2016, Etihad Airways contributed US$3.8 billion to the US economy, supported more than 30,000 American jobs, and brought 280,000 additional visitors to the United States. These visitors, who travelled from growing markets historically ignored by US carriers and partners, contributed US$1.9 billion to the US economy and supported an additional 22,000 American jobs. Etihad Airways is also a major customer of widebody aircraft built by the Boeing Company, with firm orders for 71 GE-powered Boeing 787s and 25 Boeing 777Xs, both of which will support the airlines fleet renewal programme. All of the airlines First Class seating, as well as The Residence on the Airbus A380, is built by US based aircraft cabin interior manufacturer B/E Aerospace, now part of Rockwell Collins. In 2012, Etihad Airways also signed a deal valued at more than a billion US dollars with aviation computer technology provider Sabre Airline Solutions. Etihad Airways currently operates 42 non-stop flights a week to five US gateways Chicago, Dallas/Fort Worth, Los Angeles, New York and Washington. Additionally, Etihad Cargo operates twice weekly Boeing 777F freighter services to and from Rickenbacker International Airport in Columbus, Ohio, and Tucson, Arizona. Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al-Maktoum, Emirates Chairman and Chief Executive officiated the ceremony. He was joined at the event by Sir Tim Clark, President Emirates Airline; Tom Enders, Airbus Chief Executive Officer; Dominic Horwood, Rolls-Royce, Director - Customer and Services; His Excellency Ali Al Ahmed, UAE Ambassador to Germany and Frank Horch, Senator for Economy, Transport and Innovation of the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg. Sheikh Ahmed said: This is a tremendous moment for Emirates, for Airbus and for our many partners involved in the A380 programme. There is no doubt that the A380 has had a big positive impact on aerospace manufacturing and the broader aviation industry, supporting hundreds of thousands of jobs and stimulating innovation and new product development in many related areas such as ground handling, catering, airport facilities and cabin products, to name a few. Importantly, the A380 also brought the flying experience for our customers to the next level. The aircraft itself is a showpiece of engineering. It is the worlds largest commercial passenger jet but it is quiet and efficient and at Emirates weve utilised the onboard real estate to redefine the thinking around inflight products and experience. Our flight crew love to fly it and our customers love to fly in it. For Emirates, the A380 has been a success. Weve been able to utilise it at slot-constrained airports, as well as at regional and secondary airports where we have grown passenger demand. Each time we deploy an A380 onto a route, it typically stimulates further traffic and demand as travellers are attracted by our flagship A380 experience. We remain committed to the programme and will work closely with Airbus and our partners to continually enhance our A380 product as we look ahead to receiving our remaining 42 aircraft on order. We are extremely proud of our long-standing relationship with Emirates a partnership that has been integral to the A380 programme, said Tom Enders. It is a source of immense satisfaction for everyone at Airbus that such a visionary airline has believed in the A380 from the beginning and chosen it as its flagship and the backbone of its operations. And, of course, it is always exciting to hear positive feedback from our customers and passengers about the aircraft, while associating it with Dubais success as the worlds most dynamic air transport hub. Dominic Horwood said: We would like to congratulate Emirates on this momentous occasion. We are very proud to be powering their 100th Airbus A380 and look forward to building on our strong relationship in years to come. Powered by Rolls-Royce engines, Emirates 100th A380 is configured in three cabin classes, with 14 private suites in First class, 76 seats in Business and 426 seats in Economy. It also features the airlines newly revamped Onboard Lounge. It will be on display at the upcoming Dubai Air Show and will enter service afterwards. New York, Nov 8(Just Earth News): Reiterating the need to bring to justice the killers of two United Nations expert in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Security Council urged the countrys authorities to continue to cooperate with investigations into the incident. The experts, Michael Sharp of the United States and Zaida Catalan of Sweden were abducted in the country on 12 March. Their remains were found outside the city of Kananga in the DRCs Kasai-Central province by UN peacekeepers two weeks later. In a statement read out by Ambassador Sebastiano Cardi of Italy, which holds the Councils presidency for the month of November, the 15-member body also encouraged the Group of Experts, of which Sharp and Catalan were members, to consider, within its current mandate and in cooperation with relevant actors, including national authorities, issues related to illicit financial activity, including money laundering operations, supporting the activities of armed groups and criminal networks involved in destabilizing activities in the African nation. In that regard, the Security Council welcomes the decisions of the International Conference of the Great Lakes Region [in October] on the fight against illegal exploitation of natural resources in the Great Lakes region and encourages member States to further increase cooperation in fighting illegal exploitation and trade of natural resources, including gold or wildlife, read the statement. The Security Council further encouraged the Group of Experts to work with UN Member States and relevant international organizations, such as the UN International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and the International Air Transport Association (IATA), so they can produce recommendations to streamline and enhance the control of unwrought gold transported in carry-on luggage. Also in the statement, the Council warned against attacks on the UN Mission in the country (known by its French acronym, MONUSCO), UN entities, and their associated personnel, including the Group of Experts, and reiterated its readiness to designate individuals and groups responsible for attacks for sanctions. Photo: MONUSCO/Myriam Asmani Source: www.justearthnews.com Kabul, Nov 3 (IBNS): At least seven Taliban were killed during clash in Afghanistan's Arghandab district on Thursday, media reports said on Friday. Deputy Police Chief Col. Ghulam Jilani Farahi told Pajhwok Afghan News the clash took place on Thursday night in the Bagh Bazaar area. Bodies of two militants were recovered. According to reports, weapons and some explosives were also found in the area where the clash occurred. The incident left five Talibans wounded, media reports said. New York, Nov 3(Just Earth News):As more than 3,000 desperate, tired and hungry Rohingya refugees have crossed into Bangladesh from Myanmar over the past two days, United Nations agencies and their partners are working around the clock to provide urgent life-saving aid and shelter to this latest influx. Most people I talked to walked for eight to ten days to get to the border, Olivia Headon, a press officer for the International Organization for Migration (IOM), said Friday, adding: They had nothing to eat or drink after the first few days. Fleeing the violence which has convulsed their communities in Myanmar's Northern Rakhine state since late August, these latest arrivals, after waiting for low tide in the paddy fields near the border, join over 820,000 Rohingya refugees already living in some safety in Bangladesh's Cox's Bazar, where over 607,320 have arrived since 25 August. Headon said the new arrivals expressed their desire to find family members who had already crossed into Bangladesh. Several explained they had hoped to leave Myanmar sooner, but had to wait to harvest and sell their grain to raise funds for their journey, she explained. One man told me he had to pay someone to carry his elderly mother. Meanwhile, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), and partners have distributed tokens, direct food supplies, and offered medical care for those at the Anjuman Para border crossing. A reception area at Balukhali in the Bangladeshi city of Cox's Bazar, run by the IOM, is providing emergency assistance and self-settlement kits to improve living condition for the new arrivals. UNHCR is also scaling up relief efforts to cope with the new influx of refugees around Kutupalong camp near Cox's Bazar. More than 2,000 of them have moved towards UNHCR's transit centre near Kutupalong camp, including some vulnerable refugees who were taken by bus, Babar Baloch, UNHCR spokesperson told reporters at the regular press briefing in Geneva. He added that this comes as our staff just relocated over 400 recent arrivals to a new extension to Kutupalong camp. In related news, preliminary data from a nutrition assessment conducted last week at Kutupalong refugee camp in Cox's Bazar shows a 7.5 per cent prevalence of life-threatening severe acute malnutrition a rate double that seen among Rohingya child refugees in May 2017, UNICEF said. The Rohingya children in the camp who have survived horrors in Myanmar's northern Rakhine state and a dangerous journey here are to already caught up in a catastrophe, said UNICEF Bangladesh Representative Edouard Beigbeder. Those with severe malnutrition are now at risk of dying from an entirely preventable and treatable cause. UNICEF and partners are treating over 2,000 acutely malnourished children at 15 treatment centres, with six additional centres currently being set up. The agency is also working with health partners to identify and treat diarrhoea and pneumonia, and will be conducting mass vaccination and nutrition screening campaigns this month. The humanitarian community needs to be able to do far more to treat and protect these extremely vulnerable children, Beigbeder said. For that we need far more attention to the crisis, and far more resources for the response. These children need help right now. Photo: Olivia Headon/UN Migration Agency Source: www.justearthnews.com New York, Nov 7(Just Earth News): Strongly condemning the widespread violence in Myanmars Rakhine state, which has led to the displacement of over 600,000 members of the countrys minority Muslim Rohingya community, the United Nations Security Council on Monday called on the Government to end the use of excessive military force and intercommunal violence in the region. In a statement read out by SebastianoCardi of Italy, the President of the Security Council for the month of November, the 15-member body also called on the Government to restore civilian administration and apply the rule of law, and to take immediate steps in accordance with [the Governments] obligations and commitments to respect human rights, including the rights of women, children, and persons belonging to vulnerable groups, without discrimination and regardless of ethnicity, religion, or citizenship status. The Council also urged the Government to implement measures in line with its resolution 2106 (2013) to prevent and respond to incidents of sexual violence, and encouraged it to work with the Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict. The Council also expressed concern over severely limited humanitarian access to the affected parts of the region and demanded that the Government ensure immediate, safe and unhindered access to UN and other humanitarian actors, and ensure the safety and security of humanitarian personnel. In the Presidential Statement, the Security Council also welcomed the Myanmars decision to establish a Union Enterprise Mechanism and urged the Government to ensure that the Mechanism supported such return and allowed United Nations agencies full access. Further, welcoming the Governments support for recommendations by the Advisory Commission on Rakhine State and calling for their full implementation, the Council stressed the importance of transparent investigations into allegations of human rights abuses and violations, including sexual violence and abuse and violence against children, and of holding to account all those responsible for such acts. In this regard, the Security Council calls upon the Government of Myanmar to cooperate with all relevant United Nations bodies, mechanisms and instruments, in particular the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, added the Presidential Statement. Also in the Statement, the Council commended the provision of humanitarian assistance and support for dialogue by Bangladesh as well as other regional countries and organizations; and requested the Secretary-General to continue to engage with the Myanmar through good offices. It also encouraged the UN chief to consider, as appropriate, appointing a Special Adviser on Myanmar. UNICEF/LeMoyne Source: www.justearthnews.com Kabul, Nov 7 (IBNS): An explosion was heard near a TV station in Kabul city on Tuesday morning. Local Tolo News reported the presence of a gunmen inside the building that houses Shamshad TV. The channel has since gone off air and casualties are feared. Reporting from the scene, a journalist told the network that "insurgents detonated explosive device at gate and then gunmen stormed the building." Further details awaited. Kabul, Nov 7 (IBNS): Gunmen attacked a private TV sation in Afghanistan's capital Kabul city on Tuesday and left at least one worker dead, media reports said. One of the assailants detonated his explosives, paving the ground for others to enter the building, an area resident told country's Pajhwok Afghan News. The attackers and security forces are currently exchanging fire. One of the attacker, who is armed with rifles and hand grenades, is still engaged in a clash with security forces. However, Taliban have denied their involvement in the Shamshad TV attack. Austin, Nov 6 (IBNS) A lone gunman killed at least 20 people at a church in Sutherland Springs, Texas, on Sunday, said media reports. The US media quoted Wilson County Sheriff Joe Tackitt saying that 20 or more people were killed in the shooting. The gunman was dead, said reports. The shooting occurred in the First Baptist Church, which is a small county church. The exact number of injured was not yet known. US President Donald Trump tweeted: "May God be w/ the people of Sutherland Springs, Texas. The FBI & law enforcement are on the scene. I am monitoring the situation from Japan." May God be w/ the people of Sutherland Springs, Texas. The FBI & law enforcement are on the scene. I am monitoring the situation from Japan. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 5, 2017 Texas governor Greg Abbott tweeted: "Our prayers are with all who were harmed by this evil act. Our thanks to law enforcement for their response. More details from DPS soon." (Image: Screengrab) Kabul, Nov 7 (IBNS): The Islamic State has claimed the responsibility for the Gunmen attack on a private TV station in Afghanistan's capital Kabul city, an incident which occurred on Tuesday, media reports said. The attack has left one worker dead. One of the assailants detonated his explosives, paving the ground for others to enter the building, an area resident told country's Pajhwok Afghan News. The attackers and security forces were exchanging fire even after the attack. One of the attackers, who was armed with rifles and hand grenades, was engaged in a clash with security forces. Ottawa, Nov 7 (IBNS): Facing a barrage of questions from the Opposition on Monday about the Paradise Papers leak, the Liberal government has ensured they will carry out a review on the Canadian names that have come up, media reports said. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in the House of Commons: "We are fully committed to fighting tax evasion and tax avoidance." "With respect to the Paradise Papers, the (Canada Revenue Agency) is reviewing links to Canadian entities and will take every appropriate action . . . . We will continue to work for a system that is fair," the PM added. National Revenue Minister Diane Lebouthillier confirmed that the CRA has already initiated a review and probing the names of the Canadians present in the papers. More than 300 Canadians whose names are present in Paradise Papers, described as the largest leak of financial data, are suspected to have used offshore tax havens to evade taxes. The figure is slightly around 3,300. The revelation comes from Paradise Papers, as the documents are being called by a collective of international journalists who after months of ferreting a clutch of records and internal communications from Bermuda's Appleby and Singapore's Asiaciti presented their findings on Sunday night. Paradise Papers refer to a trove - 13.4 million files - of financial data leaked from two firms The reports have shown that Canada is Applyby's one of the biggest markets after the U.S., the U.K. and China. The data has brought number of Canadian firms and individuals under the scanner who have paid very little or almost no tax as they have received the benefits from the offshore trusts and corporations which are set up in countries. Canadian supermarket giant, Loblaw, issued a statement that reads: "the CRA is aware of all of our international income. Our activities [...] are legal and transparent." It is said that Bermuda firm Appleby and Singapore-based Asiaciti helped the ultra-rich & powerful move money abroad Appleby allegedly helped clients set up offshore firms and manage bank accounts to evade taxes, manage realty, buy planes and yachts, move tonnes of money across the globe. (Reporting by Suman Das) Winnipeg, Nov 7 (IBNS): A new exhibit at the Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR) has explored the global refugee crisis through the eyes of two teenage boys - a 13-year-old Syrian who survived a perilous voyage across the Mediterranean and a 15-year-old boy in Spain who felt compelled to respond. Seeking Refuge is centred on a work of art created by 15-year-old Achilleas Souras from lifejackets left on the beaches of the Greek island of Lesbos by thousands of migrants and refugees. Resembling a domed-shaped shelter that people can crawl inside, his structures have been attracting attention from all over the world. The installation is brought to life by two emotive videos. One shows Souras assembling his lifejacket dome and sharing his concerns about refugees. The other, filmed by UNICEF in Lesbos, features 13-year-old Mustafa Al Said, who describes fleeing war across a dangerous sea, along with his hopes, fears and homesickness. Abandoned lifejackets - now a pervasive symbol of the danger facing millions of global refugees - are visible in both films, linking the stories of two teenagers and their common humanity. "The exhibit builds awareness of an important and current human rights issue-and also shows us the power of youth to effect change," curator Isabelle Masson said. "It's a call to action-not only for young audiences but also for visitors of all ages." An accompanying exhibit in the Museum's Rights Today gallery encourages thought and conversation about asylum seekers in Canada. Seeking Safety was researched by the CMHR, working with the United Nations High Commission for Refugees Canada. It explores, through video, images and documents, the stories of people who have come to Canada looking for protection. Mohammed Alsaleh was among 25,000 Syrians accepted as refugees to Canada. Eddy Ramirez was a student in Montreal when the political climate in Venezuela became too dangerous for her to return. A video interview with University of Manitoba law professor Shauna Labman broke down common misconceptions surrounding the arrival of refugees and asylum seekers. The journey of those who cross into Canada by foot is also depicted through photographs. "This exhibit helps clarify misconceptions about people who cross the border to seek asylum in Canada," curator Armando Perla said. "Who is an asylum seeker, who is a refugee, and what is the difference?" Seeking Refuge runs at the CMHR until August 2018; Seeking Safety will continue till October 2018. After CCI penalty, FHRAI writes SEBI to stop OYO IPO The Federation of Hotel and Restaurant Association of India has written a letter to SEBI to stop the proceedings of the IPO of OYO, as reported by the Economic Times. This has come after the Co... November 16, 2022 | 4:03 pm Markets end the day in Green Indian equity markets had another topsy-turve day today. Markets swung between red and green territory all through the day. Nifty 50 ended, up by 6.25 points. Sensex ended, up by 107.73 po... November 16, 2022 | 3:40 pm Passenger vehicle sales may touch 3.8 million units in FY 23, says Tata Motors MD Passenger vehicle sales in India may touch 3.8 million units in FY 23, Tata Motors MD, Shailesh Chandra, said. He also added that a large part of these sales will be because of the pent-up dema... November 16, 2022 | 3:21 pm Sai Silks Saree Retailers to launch IPO soon, gets nod from SEBI Sai Silks (Kalamandir) is one of the largest retailers of ethnic apparel. The company has received a nod to float an initial public offer (IPO) in the market to raise funds. As per the Draft Re... November 16, 2022 | 2:49 pm HAL stock price rises after it gets LOI for 9 helicopters from Indian Coast Guard In hefty trading volumes on Wednesday, Hindustan Aeronautics' shares surged 7% to an all-time high of Rs 2,697.70 on the BSE after the company obtained a letter of intent (LoI) from the Indian ... November 16, 2022 | 2:38 pm A federal judge in Utah has scheduled two public hearings to determine how to draw the districts in a county where the Native vote has been suppressed for decades. The hearings take place next Thursday, November 16, in San Juan County . That's where Judge Robert J. Shelby concluded that local officials had "race-based motives" when they drew the boundaries of the voting districts. By packing Native voters into one district, the county diluted their power, Shelby ruled in January 2016 . As a result, they have been only able to elect one Native candidate to the county commission even though they essentially represent the majority of the population. But the situation could be changing with the court's guidance. Shelby and Bernard Gofman, who has been appointed as the special master in a lawsuit filed by the Navajo Nation , will take input at the hearings, one in Monticello and the other in Bluff , to find out how the districts in the county can be changed. The Nation is pleased the court is seeking input from Navajo members of the county, Navajo Nation Attorney General Ethel Branch said in a press release on Tuesday . This has been a long process and it is important that all Navajos in San Juan County are allowed an opportunity to participate in the redrawing of their election districts. Our hope is that the court will hear the concerns of our people and adopt voting districts that address their concerns and give them a much needed voice in county politics. Members of the San Juan County Commission, from left: Rebecca Benally, Bruce Adams and Phil Lyman. Photo: Rebecca Benally The county's three districts have been in place since 1986. The map was drawn after the federal government filed a different lawsuit on behalf of Native voters who said they were discriminated against. Since then, voters in District Three have consistently elected a Native candidate to the county commission. Native Americans represent a whopping 92.8 percent of the population in District Three. At the same time, the county has refused to redraw the map even though Native Americans represented 55.7 percent of the population in 2000 and 50.4 percent in 2010, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau As a result, even though Native residents outnumber White residents in the county, Native voters are outnumbered in District One and District Two. Those districts have consistently elected non-Natives to the commission. The failure to redraw the map prompted the Navajo Nation to sue the county in 2012 . Through the lawsuit, the tribe proved that race the motivating factor in the county's failure to redraw the map. "Because Navajo Nation has successfully shown that the county had race-based motives in maintaining the boundaries of District Three, and the county has failed to show that its plan for District Three was in pursuit of a compelling government interest, the court concludes that District Three is unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause and the boundary lines for the San Juan County Commission Districts must be redrawn," Judge Shelby wrote in his 33-page ruling The county's political voice has been a significant factor in the Republican push to redraw the boundaries of the Bears Ears National Monument . The Trump administration, along with allies in Congress, claim the majority of county residents -- including Native Americans -- don't support the monument even through the Navajo Nation itself does. The monument lies within county boundaries. Rebecca Benally , a citizen of the Navajo Nation and a Democrat, represents District Three on the county commission . The other members are Phil Lyman and Bruce Adams, both of whom are non-Natives and Republicans. On November 16, 2017, the court will hold a public hearing in Monticello, Utah at the Hide Out Community Center from 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. and from 3:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. at the Bluff Community Center in Bluff, Utah. Public notice will be given on the San Juan County's website. Mr. Trentadue will inquire about advertising the public meeting on the San Juan County Record newspaper website and in the newspaper. The court proposes setting up two tables at each site for the public to view large posters of the School Board Districting plans and the County Commissioner Districting plans. Each site will have tables for the public to submit comments and a court staff employee to take feedback from the public. The court requests that the parties provide large posters of the maps for these stations. The court requests that San Juan County provide the maps for the Monticello meeting and the Navajo Nation provide the maps for the Bluff meeting. The court also requested assistance from the parties in providing notice to the community through appropriate means. The parties can request assistance from the court if they need it. The court also requested that Navajo Nation arrange for two translators to attend the public meetings to assist with the meetings and the feedback areas. Navajo Nation can contact the court for assistance if necessary. The proposed plan will be given to counsel no later than Thursday, Nov. 9. Counsel will be informed if a telephone conference is necessary early next week. Judge Shelby approved the public meetings after conducting a hearing by telephone on Monday with the parties in the Navajo Nation's lawsuit. The text of an order he issued after the hearing follows: Join the Conversation Related Stories #NativeVote18 A night of election firsts and a rejection of all things Trump By Mark TrahantTrahant Reports#IndigenousNewsWire #NativeVote18 A year ago ballots from across the country were being examined by citizens, journalists, and politicians, who were all wondering, What the hell just happened? The nation woke up to a President-elect Donald J. Trump. And this morning? The Trump brand is like an overpriced hotel where you would never, ever stay a second time. Voters from Maine to Washington and all points in between rejected Trumpism. They voted for Democrats, flipping legislatures in Virginia and Washington. They voted for Medicaid. Medicaid! They voted for higher wages. And there is a clear message to Congress (if members pay attention) that governing still matters. It was a good night for Native American candidates, too. In Washington, Roxanne Murphy , Nooksack, won a second term on the Bellingham City Council with nearly 80 percent of the vote. Whats striking is that she ran against the ugly words of an opponent who called on hate instead of discourse. Murphy wrote on Facebook : Got through so much racism and misogyny during this run for office. But that was all worth it for me to defend our Bellingham community, the work of our current Bellingham City Council, to mutilate a deplorable person at the polls, get more people to vote the whole ballot, and it proved that love can win over hate. Thank you for RoxingTheVote! Several other Native candidates won office in Washington. Chris Roberts, City of Shoreline; Zachary DeWolf, Seattle School District; and Candice Wilson, to the Ferndale School Board. Washington voters also flipped the legislature from red to blue. The entire West Coast is now governed by Democrats. Renee Van Nett, a citizen of the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe, was successful in her bid for a seat on the city council in Duluth, Minnesota. Campaign photo Renee Van Nett , Leech Lake Ojibwe, won a seat on the Duluth, Minnesota, city council. She will be the first Native American woman on that body. She told the Duluth News Tribune that her victory was a credit to traditional issues that people are worried about they want someone whos accessible, someone they can call and talk to, someone who will address their needs. They want economic development. They want to be heard. Across the country diversity was a theme from election night. The first is a phrase that seems odd in 21st century America. Yet the first African American Lt. Governor in New Jersey. Another in Virginia. (Hint: The first Native American woman to serve in that capacity should be be next up, Peggy Flanagan in Minnesota .) The first Sikh mayor in Hoboken (who had to run against overt hate). The first immigrant from Liberia in Montana. The first openly lesbian mayor in Seattle. ( Huffington Post has a list of many of the firsts .) The main take away: This was a rejection of the narrow world view of the Trump. The diversity that is the future of America, won. Bigly. On the policy debate ahead, perhaps the most important vote came from Maine where voters overwhelmingly voted in favor of expanding Medicaid. Maine is one of 19 states whose Republican governors or legislatures have refused to expand Medicaid under Obamacare. This is an initiative and a process that could move to other states. This will send a clear signal to where the rest of the country is on health care, Jonathan Schleifer, executive director of the Fairness Project, told The Washington Post. This vote is important because it could tip the scales in states where the legislature says one thing and the people another. Alaska. Cough. Alaska. Put Medicaid expansion on the ballot: And it will win. Elections, of course, are always snap shots. Its dangerous to think this rout means more of the same a year from now. But the groundwork is there. And this election night will further divide many Republicans from Trump as well as those who fund elections. There is now real evidence from the best poll of all that voters are not happy with the direction of Congress or the White House. Join the Conversation Sanjay Leela Bhansalis Padmavati is stuck in a loop of controversies ahead of its release on Dec. 1. After several organisations demanding a ban on the film in wake of Rani Padminis portrayal in the film, accusing the makers of distorting historical facts, now distributors in the state have also refused to release the movie. A few days ago, Rajput Karni Sena who, for long, has been protesting against the movie, vandalising the sets and demanding a pre-screening to verify facts, observed a bandh in Chittorgarh. Whats more a former Royal family has threatened against the release of the film. Former princess Diya Kumari has said that no film should hurt the sentiments of a community by twisting historical facts. She said that if that happens, the movie will not be allowed to release. Twitter Meanwhile, the distributors want SLB and Karni Sena to reach to a solution. Only then will they release the film, said a representative. Let the Shri Rajput Karni Sena and filmmaker Sanjay Leela Bhansali reach an amicable solution. We will buy the distribution rights only after that, said Raj Bansal, a leading film distributor from the state. Congress leader Pratap Singh Kachariyawas has also joined the protests against the film demanding a ban. On the other hand, State home minister Gulab Chand Kataria came out in support of the film and said that it shall be released no matter what. Shri Rajput Sabha, the top Rajput body, has written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi giving an ultimatum of November 12 for a ban on the movie. Furthermore, a FIR has also been filed against habitual offender Sanjay Leela Bhansali. It says this type of distortion of history in films like Padmavati will ruin the history and damage the highest values for which our ancestors lived and died. If people see Padmini dancing like stage actor, who will cherish the historical saga of Jauhar, rarest of rare incident of history. There is the glorification of the most barabaric, most devil, most vulgar attacker Alauddin Khilji. As you know, about 16,000 great Rajputanis of Rajasthan dedicated their lives and became martyrs for maintenance of nations prestige, religion, culture and Bharat Mata. Why we allow such glorification of our all-time worst enemy? Twitter They have also asked the PM to warn Smriti Irani as she has formally supported for release of film, so that she may be a bit careful in such important matters and withdraw her remarks. Union Minister Uma Bharti also extended her support on the row in an open letter on social media. Starring Deepika Padukone, Ranveer Singh and Shahid Kapoor, Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Padmavati is slated to release on Dec. 1. British royals Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles couldn't have chosen a worse time to visit New Delhi. And it's giving Indians still left with a sense of injustice -- thanks to the British rule -- an unenviable karmic satisfaction. Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles reached New Delhi today to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi as part of their ongoing Asia tour. As their plane landed in the national capital, they were greeted by a city enveloped in a thick smog layer, with reduced visibility, making it difficult to breathe in air without a sense of choking suffocation. Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles, the Duchess of Cornwall arrive in Delhi pic.twitter.com/coI3zyNudz ANI (@ANI) November 8, 2017 These images of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles posted by news agency ANI are actually not blurred but it is the pollution that is making it look hazy. Imagine what the two British royals must be thinking at the moment. As if this wasn't enough, Indian Twitterati jumped on their misfortune and take some sort of sadistic pleasure from the whole mistimed visit. Twitter was abuzz with comments suggesting how this was the best revenge Indians could've exacted from the British as a fitting response to years of colonization. Yes, you read it right. Here are a few tweets that will show you how people have reacted. They looted one of the most richest country in the world inside out and exploited it to ashes for over 200 years. Even the Kohinoor inside their museum belongs to us. They stole it from a holy statue of Lord Indra. They deserved this!! Because Karma! Supriti Chatterjee (@SupritiC) November 8, 2017 We're taking revenge from the British and you have a problem? DJ (@daljeetm) November 8, 2017 Some actually expressed their concern and tweeted, Well, this is actually a major concern but these Twitterati's are actually hilarious. ALSO READ: Here's Everything That Makes Delhi Air So Poisonous And Spoils Your Lungs As You Breathe Pramodini Roul was just 15-years-old when a 25-year-old paramilitary soldier riding on motorbike threw acid at her because she had rejected his marriage proposal. Youtube Screenshot/NewsToday The attack left her blind in both eyes and horrific burns melted her entire face. Since the attack, Pramodini Roul lovingly called Rani, has been in and out of hospital and has gone through five reconstructive surgeries. YouTube Screenshot/NewsToday Also Read: 21-YO Acid Attack Survivor Shares Amazing Post-Recovery Pic Because It's 'Time To Stop Hiding' The next few years was filled with unspeakable suffering, she spent four years bedridden at her house in Odisha in eastern India while her widowed mother took care of her alone. But the most unexpected things happened during her regular trips to the hospital. Rani, bumped into the love of her life, Saroj Kumar Sahoo. Saroj Kumar Sahoo-who was a friend of her nurse who had helped Rani though depression and was a big support to her mother. YouTube Screenshot/NewsToday Also Read: This Acid Attack Victim Is The Epitome Of Strength & Resilience & Her Story Will Move You After meeting Saroj, Rani says she has finally found a reason to live happily. The two have been living together for a year in New Delhi and are now planning to get married. Saroj even he quit his job and started spending all his time looking after Rani. The Daily Mail quoted Rani as saying, "Saroj really treats me like a queen. He loves me like the way I am. He always encourages me to live life happily. He has become a part of me. I would not have been able to see the world today if I did not have him in my life." A Japanese woman dubbed the "Black Widow," tricked her lovers into drinking cyanide and swindled millions in insurance payouts and inheritance, reports AFP. AFP Also read: This Company In Japan Is Planning To Give Extra 6 Paid Leaves To All Non-Smokers The woman named, Chisako Kakehi, 70, has been sentenced to death by hanging for the murder of three men - including one husband - and the attempted murder of another. The sentence brings an end to high profile scandal that has gripped Japan. Kakehi's sinister act has been compared to that of a black widow spider that kills its mate after copulation. The accused made the victims drink a cyanide compound, with a murderous intention in all four cases, Judge Ayako Nakagawa told the court, NHK reported, as cited by AFP. According to reports, Kakehi ensured that she received massive payouts from her victims' life insurance plans before killing them. She amassed roughly $8.8 million in the past ten years. She tricked her victims into drinking the poison, telling them that the drink was a health cocktail. Kakehi was arrested in November 2014 and later charged with killing her fourth husband in December 2013, reports RT. Also read: A Japanese Company Is Suing Apple For "Stealing" the Animoji Name From Their App AP Kakehi was arrested after an autopsy report revealed that her fourth husband, 75-year-old Isao Kakehi, died from ingesting a fatal dose of cyanide just a month after the two were married. After admitting to that 2013 murdera crime she said she carried out because he was stingy with his moneythe 70-year-old appeared to mock the threat of a death sentence, according to the Japan Times. "I killed my husband," Kakehi reportedly said. "I have no intention of hiding the guilt. I will laugh it off and die if I am sentenced to death tomorrow." Reports further state that her lawyers have insisted she has dementia, and vowed to appeal Tuesday's verdict. But the presiding judge, Ayako Nakagawa, said there's nothing can change the final sentence a Kakehi was well aware of her heinous crimes. As Delhi NCR continues to remain under a thick blanket of smog, the focus is once again back on the stubble burning in neighbouring Punjab and Haryana. BCCL Despite the National Green Tribunal and the Supreme Court banning it, stubble burning has been continuing in both the states, unchecked. After being pulled up by the NGT, the Haryana government has stepped up action against farmers indulging in stubble burning. BCCL According to Haryana Environment Minister Vipul Goyal, authorities have booked over 1,000 farmers and imposed a fine of nearly Rs 12 lakh on them. "Given the air pollution from stubble burning, the Pollution Control Board has started a statewide campaign. Under this till now, 1,011 farmers have been identified for burning stubble across the state. The department has filed police cases as well as imposed fines on them," he said. PTI He said cases have been filed against 227 farmers who were caught by the Pollution Control Board and 454 farmers have been slapped fine of over Rs 11.89 lakh. "Not only paddy, burning the residue of any crop is harmful to the environment. It is not only deteriorating the environment but also reducing the fertility of the lands of farmers," the minister said. If theres one thing the artificial intelligence community can agree upon, its that any threat to the world by the technology is most likely to come from it being misused, as opposed to it gaining sentience and taking over. Now, AI researchers from Australia and Canada are doing their bit to prevent automated munitions from being set loose on the world. Reuters The researchers issued an open letter to the Prime Minister of Australia, Malcolm Turnbull, and of Canada, Justin Trudeau, to take a stand against weaponising AI. The letter comes ahead of a UN conference on the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) which restricts or bans weapons across the world that are excessive or indiscriminate in their use of force. More than 300 robotics and AI experts have signed the petition, looking to block future lethal weapons that could be automated with no human control, and therefore would have no clear moral line. Of course, strike drones are the first that come to mind, though it also includes unmanned combat vehicles and robots currently being developed by militaries across the world. The petition calls for Australia and Canada to work with other countries in setting up an international consensus to outlaw these automated munitions, similar to the Non-Proliferation Treaty on nuclear weapons signed in 1970. In this way, our government can reclaim its position of moral leadership on the world stage as demonstrated previously in other areas like the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons, the letter states. REUTERS Autonomous weapon systems threaten to become the third revolution in warfare. If developed, they will permit armed conflict to be fought at a scale greater than ever before, and at timescales faster than humans can comprehend. This letter follows in the footsteps of another letter to the UN previously signed by AI experts in August, asking it to take action. Led by Elon Musk, it said the misuse of AI could be the greatest threat we face as a civilization. The CCW talks are scheduled to begin November 14, though its anyones guess what the final consensus will be. Space agencies and scientists across the world are excited for us to begin making our way to other planets to study them, starting with upcoming trips to Mars. However, there might be a bit of a pall over the entire endeavour, according to Stephen Hawking. According to the theoretical physicist, humans need to become truly spacefaring in the next few hundred years, or face extinction. NASA HQ Photo/Flickr At a video conference at a summit in Beijing this weekend, Hawking said he believes Earths exploding population, coupled with our mounting energy needs and global pollution, could eventually render the planet uninhabitable by the year 2600. Before that happens, he hopes well have progressed to the point where we can at least get on spacecraft and fly away to other inhabitable worlds. ALSO READ: Stephen Hawking's Chilling Reminder To Humanity: AI May Replace Humans Altogether Some of the potential to do this, Hawking believes, may lie in his project Breakthrough Starshot. A partnership with billionaire investor Yuri Milner and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, the $100 million project is attempting to develop tiny unmanned probes with sails that harness a type of laser propulsion. Concept design of the optical "sails" - Breakthrough Initiatives These probes would be able to travel to other star systems at 20 percent the speed of light. If they work, a probe could reach the Alpha Centauri star system 4.37 light-years away in 20 to 30 years, with another four years to reestablish contact with Earth. Spacecraft based on this technology could theoretically get us to Mars in under an hour, or even let large groups of humans migrate to other habitable planets within their lifetime. Hopefully though, the situation wont ever degrade so much that wed need to actually do that. Chart of the Day: Goldman Sachs - Financial Services Barchart - 24 minutes ago The Chart of the Day belongs to the financial services company Goldman Sachs (GS). I found the stock by sorting the Russell 3000 Index stocks first by the most frequent number of new highs in the last... GS : 382.88 (+0.14%) PPI Propels Markets Market Tea Leaves - 58 minutes ago Yesterday we suggested an Upside Day and the markets didn't disappoint. Will the markets continue to the Upside? 'War not an excuse:' Ukraine rail boss keeps trains running AP - 1 hour ago Among the bitter lessons that Ukrainians have had to learn in the nearly nine months since Russia invaded is that whats here today can be destroyed tomorrow and that nothing in war can be taken for... $SPX : 3,991.73 (+0.87%) $DOWI : 33,592.92 (+0.17%) $IUXX : 11,871.15 (+1.45%) UK inflation accelerates to 41-year high of 11.1% AP - 1 hour ago Britains inflation rate rose to a 41-year high in October, fueling demands for the government to do more to ease the nations cost-of-living crisis when it releases new tax and spending plans Thursday... $SPX : 3,991.73 (+0.87%) $DOWI : 33,592.92 (+0.17%) $IUXX : 11,871.15 (+1.45%) CRC Group has hired Carol Blair as a professional lines broker for the CRC Midtown Manhattan office, effective October 1, 2017. Carol brings more than 16 years of experience in brokerage to CRC in professional risks in surplus lines. Her specialties include healthcare, errors and omissions (E&O) and directors and officers (D&O) risks. At CRC, Carol joins the Professional Executive Group, which writes more than $1.2 billion in premium each year. She will give retail agents access to professional lines facilities, tools and resources provided by one of the nations leading wholesalers. CRC is a division of CRC Group, one of the largest wholesale providers of property and casualty insurance in the U.S. Source: CRC Group The family of a woman killed in a 2010 crash involving a Melrose Place actress will receive a $4.8 million settlement. NJ.com reports most of the money will come from the hosts of a party where actress Amy Locane-Bovenizer was drinking before the crash. Rachel and Carlos Sagebien agreed to pay $3.3 million through their insurance company to the family of Helene Seeman. Locane-Bovenizer and her estranged husband will pay $1.5 million. The actress served about 2 1/2 years in prison after being convicted of vehicular manslaughter and other charges. In a resentencing hearing, a judge said he erred by imposing too light a sentence, but declined to send Locane-Bovenizer back to prison. The state has appealed that decision. The Montgomery Township crash also injured Seemans husband, Fred. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics New Jersey A bank in Nepal is the latest victim in a string of cyber heists, though most of the stolen funds have been recovered, two officials involved in the investigation confirmed on Tuesday. [Editors note: Reuters issued a clarification to say it was the Nepalese banks system, not the SWIFT system, that had been hacked.] Hackers last month made about $4.4 million in fraudulent transfers from Kathmandu-based NIC Asia Bank to countries including Britain, China, Japan, Singapore and the United States when the bank was closed for annual festival holidays, according to Nepal media reports. All but $580,000 of the funds were recovered after Nepal asked other nations to block release of the stolen money, Chinta Mani Shivakoti, deputy governor of the Central Nepal Rastra Bank (NRB), told Reuters. Brussels-based SWIFT said last month that security controls instituted after last years $81 million theft from Bangladeshs central bank helped thwart some recent hacking attempts, but it warned that cyber criminals continue to target SWIFT customers. SWIFT or the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication is a co-operative owned by its user banks. It declined to comment on the NIC Asia Bank hack, saying it does not discuss specific users. Representatives with NIC Asia Bank, one of dozens of private banks in Nepal, were not available for comment. The chief of Nepals Central Investigation Bureau, Pushkar Karki, confirmed to Reuters that his agency was investigating the theft. KPMG is also involved in the investigation, according to Nepali media reports. KPMG representatives could not immediately be reached for comment. The central bank intends to release guidelines on how to thwart such incidents after investigations are completed, according to Shivakoti. The incident showed there are some weaknesses with the IT department of the bank, Shivakoti said. SWIFT said in a statement on Tuesday that it offers assistance to banks when it learns of potential fraud cases, then shares relevant information with other clients on an anonymous basis. This preserves confidentiality, whilst assisting other SWIFT users to take appropriate measures to protect themselves, it said. We have no indication that our network and core messaging services have been compromised, SWIFT added. (Reporting by Gopal Sharma, additional reporting by Jeremy Wagstaff in Singapore and Jim Finkle in Toronto; editing by Richard Balmforth and Matthew Lewis) Topics Cyber Starr Cos. reaffirmed its commitment to the Singapore insurance market, despite the fact it has decided to discontinue underwriting new business through the Starr Singapore Underwriting Agents, representing its Lloyds Syndicate 1919. Starr emphasized that Starr International Insurance Singapore Pte. (SIIS), established in 2012, continues to write business in Singapore. Starr said it is fully committed to growing its Singapore based businesses through SIIS, which also serves as an important part of Starrs Asia Pacific insurance operations. Starrs Singapore based team underwrites a variety of commercial risks including, property, construction, power, engineering, marine, and liability. Additionally, Starr underwrites accident & health related insurance. Source: Starr Cos. Topics Trends Market Alphabet Inc.s Waymo will launch a ride-hailing service with no human behind the steering wheel and has been testing the fully self-driving cars on public roads in Arizona, Chief Executive John Krafcik said on Tuesday. The test without a human in the drivers seat is a first in the United States as large tech companies, big automakers and well-funded startups race to develop fully autonomous cars. While self-driving car companies test their vehicles in public, they routinely have a human in the drivers seat ready to take over if the technology fails. Waymo said members of the public will begin riding in its fleet of Fiat Chrysler Pacifica minivans without human drivers in a test run of the service in the next few months in certain areas of Phoenix, Arizona, which has dry, predictable weather. Developers are still grappling with vehicle performance in snow or heavy rain. Members of the public taking part in the companys trial in Phoenix will be its first customers, using a ride-hailing app. At first, those passengers will be accompanied in the back seat by a Waymo employee, but eventually they will travel alone, although they will be able to hit a button to stop the car. It will roll out the service to the wider public at a later date, although it did not say when. The service will be free at first, but Waymo expects at some point to start charging for rides, a potential way to earn revenue to help offset the steep costs involved in developing the technology. The state of Arizona has no restrictions on self-driving cars, unlike California and some other states. Because we see so much potential in shared mobility, the first way people will get to experience Waymos fully self-driving technology will be as a driverless service, Krafcik said in prepared remarks after announcing the launch in Lisbon. The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration did not immediately comment on Tuesday but said in September last year that conventionally designed vehicles that can be operated autonomously faced no specific federal legal barrier. With over eight years of testing under its belt, Waymo is a pioneer of self-driving technology and has tested its system in six states, the latest being Michigan. Last week, U.S. auto retailer AutoNation Inc. announced a multiyear partnership for vehicle maintenance and repairs for Waymos self-driving car operations. General Motors Co., which acquired autonomous driving start-up Cruise Automation for a reported $1 billion last year, has signaled its intent to test a robotaxi service in the near future. GM Chief Executive Mary Barra said in October the company aims to take the driver out of its self-driving vehicles in quarters, not years. The carmakers goal for its Cruise self-driving car unit is to safely develop and deploy self-driving cars at scale in dense, urban environments, not suburbs. (Reporting by Alexandria Sage, Additional reporting by David Shepardson in Washington and Joe White in Detroit; Editing by Peter Henderson, Lisa Shumaker and Susan Thomas) Topics USA Auto Tech Arizona A new Arkansas-based surplus lines insurer has been approved to do business in the state, according to the Arkansas Insurance Department. Vault E&S Insurance Company has been granted authority to sell property, casualty (excluding workers compensation), and marine insurance products as a domestic surplus lines insurer. The company is a newly formed Arkansas corporation and is a wholly owned subsidiary of Allied World Insurance Company, which is a subsidiary of Fairfax Financial Holdings Limited. Vault E&S will provide excess and surplus lines insurance to individuals in the high-net-worth market for non-standard and unique exposures related to high value properties, watercraft, jewelry and other valuable collections. The company will operate to complement Vault Reciprocal Exchange, a reciprocal insurance exchange organized under Florida law, which will write direct personal lines business to individuals in the high-net worth market. Vault E&S is the 25th company overall and sixth domestic company Insurance Commissioner Allen Kerr has granted authority to in 2017. Since becoming Commissioner in 2015, he has granted authority to 60 companies. Fairfax is a Canadian holding company which, through its subsidiaries, is engaged in property and casualty insurance, reinsurance and investment management. Fairfax holdings include 18 U.S. domestic insurers. Source: Arkansas Insurance Department Topics Carriers Excess Surplus Arkansas Alliant Employee Benefits, a division of Newport Beach, Calif.-based Alliant Insurance Services, has tapped Dallas-based Alan Dale to add additional strength to its life and disability practice. As first vice president, Dale will play a lead consulting role within the growing practice, while also providing essential consulting support to Alliant Employee Benefits absence management practice. A 26-year employee benefits veteran, Dale has experience working with large-to-midsized clients across a broad range of industries. In his role at Alliant, he will focus on serving a diverse portfolio of existing clients while developing new relationships throughout the region. Prior to joining Alliant, Dale spent 12 years as a principal in one of the nations largest employee benefits firms. In this position, he served as the central region leader of the companys life, disability, and absence management practice. He also has extensive consulting experience on the carrier side of the business. Source: Alliant Employee Benefits Topics Alliant Global insurance company Premier Assurance Group (PA Group), headquartered in Coral Gables, Fla., has named Karen Cordero-Fleites its director of marketing and communications. Cordero-Fleites has more than 10 years of experience in the international insurance industry. In her new role, Cordero-Fleites will be responsible for leading PA Groups brand unification by consolidating all of the companys products and services under one corporate image. She will also manage the planning and budget for the companys marketing initiatives. Cordero-Fleites was previously the senior marketing manager of Global Benefits Group Inc., where she led the companys rebranding efforts and improved the positioning of its brand and product image throughout Latin America. Her experience also includes serving as marketing specialist at Best Doctors Insurance, where she supported the growth of the brand in Latin America, and subsequently in Canada and Europe. Topics Florida Kentucky accused units of Endo International Plc on Monday of contributing to drug overdoses and an opioid epidemic by deceptively marketing its painkiller Opana ER, the latest lawsuit by state or local governments against the drugmaker. Kentucky Attorney General Andy Beshear said the lawsuit would seek to hold Endo responsible for illegally building a market for the long-term use of opioids in the state as part of an effort to boost corporate profits. The lawsuit, filed in a state court in Kentucky, said Endo sought to overstate the benefits of using Opana for the long-term treatment of chronic pain while downplaying the risk of addiction, helping to fuel a public health epidemic. My office refuses to sit back and watch families be torn apart while opioid manufacturers like Endo line their pockets at the expense of our communities and our future, Beshear said in a statement. Endos chief legal officer, Matthew Maletta, said in a statement that Beshears allegation that the drugmaker was trying to profit at the expense of peoples health was patently offensive. We intend to vigorously defend the company against the claims set forth in this lawsuit, Maletta said. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, opioids were involved in over 33,000 deaths in 2015, the latest year for which data is available. The death rate has continued rising, according to estimates. Endo has faced a wave of similar lawsuits over the opioid epidemic by Louisiana, New Mexico, Missouri, Mississippi and Ohio, as well as several cities and counties. Many of those cases target other drugmakers as well. In July, Endo agreed to withdraw the long-acting opioid painkiller Opana ER from the market after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration declared that its benefit did not outweigh public health risks associated with opioid abuse. In a statement, Beshear called the removal of Opana ER from the market an important step but said that Endos practices had already by then harmed people in his state. His offices lawsuit seeks penalties and compensatory and punitive damages. (Reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston; Editing by Tom Brown and Grant McCool) Topics Kentucky A jury has awarded $12 million to a Tucson, Ariz. woman who was severely incapacitated by an alleged hospital medical error. Pima County Superior Court jurors ruled in favor of Esmeralda Tripp and against the University of Arizona Health Network, now Banner-University Medical Center Tucson. Lawyers for the hospital told the Arizona Daily Star that an appeal of the verdict is likely. The 46-year-old Tripp is a mother of four and grandmother of seven. Her lawyer says Tripp now is in a persistent vegetative state. Lawyers for the hospital and other defendants had argued that Tripp didnt provide accurate information about her medical history when she went to the emergency room with pain and thin blood in September 2013. They also say they acted appropriately based on the available information. Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Topics Arizona What Is a Green-Field Investment? A green-field (also "greenfield") investment is a type of foreign direct investment (FDI) in which a parent company creates a subsidiary in a different country, building its operations from the ground up. In addition to the construction of new production facilities, these projects can also include the building of new distribution hubs, offices, and living quarters. 1:20 Green Field Investment The Basics of a Green-Field Investment The term "green-field investment" gets its name from the fact that the companyusually a multinational corporation (MNC)is launching a venture from the ground upplowing and prepping a green field. These projects are foreign direct investmentsknown simply as direct investmentsthat provide the highest degree of control for the sponsoring company. Another method of FDI includes foreign acquisitions or buying a controlling stake in a foreign company. However, when a business takes the acquisition route, they may face regulations or difficulties that can hinder the process. Green-field investments carry the same high risks and costs associated with building new factories or manufacturing plants. In a green-field project, a companys plant construction, for example, is done to its specifications, employees are trained to company standards, and fabrication processes can be tightly controlled. This type of involvement is the opposite of indirect investment, such as the purchase of foreign securities. Companies may have little or no control in operations, quality control, sales, and training if they use indirect investment. Splitting the distance between a green-field project and indirect investment is the brown-field (also "brownfield") investment. With brown-field investing, a corporation leases existing facilities and land and adapts them to suit its needs. Renovation and customization usually result in relatively lower expenses and quicker turn-around than building from scratch. Key Takeaways In a green-field investment, a parent company creates a new operation in a foreign country from the ground up. A green-field investment provides the sponsoring company with the greatest degree of control. A green-field investment poses greater risks and a greater commitment of time and capital than other types of foreign direct investments. Risks and Benefits of Green Field Investments Developing countries tend to attract prospective companies with offers of tax breaks, or they could receive subsidies or other incentives to set up a green-field investment. While these concessions may result in lower corporate tax revenues for the foreign community in the short run, the economic benefits and the enhancement of local human capital can deliver positive returns for the host nation over the long term. As with any startup, green-field investments entail higher risks and higher costs associated with building new factories or manufacturing plants. Smaller risks include construction overruns, problems with permitting, difficulties in accessing resources and issues with local labor. Companies contemplating green-field projects typically invest large sums of time and money in advance research to determine feasibility and cost-effectiveness. Pros Tax breaks, financial incentives Everything done to specifications Complete control of venture Cons Greater capital outlay More complex to plan Longer-term committment As a long-term commitment, one of the greatest risks in green field investments is the relationship with the host countryespecially politically unstable one. Any circumstances or events that result in the company needing to pull out of a project at any time can be financially devastating for the business. Real-World Examples of Green Field Investment The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) tracks green-field investmentsthat is, the investment by a foreign entity to either establish a new business in the U.S. or expand an existing foreign-owned business. U.S. green-field expenditures, according to data released by the BEA in July 2018, totaled US$259.6 billion in 2017. Also, $4.1 billion went to establish new businesses. Manufacturing expenditures accounted for 40% of the total. Food and information were the most popular industries. In April 2015, Toyota announced its first green-field project in Mexico in three years, costing US$1.5 billion for the new manufacturing plant in Guanajuato. The factory is scheduled to open in December 2019 with an eventual goal of hiring 3,000 employees and the capacity to produce 300,000 pickup trucks per yearthe initial capacity and workforce will be a third of that number. Along with the plant, the automaker plans to build or improve urban development to provide housing for the workers, called Toyota City. Historically, Mexico has been viewed as an attractive country for green-field investments due in large part to its low costs of labor and manufacturing, as well as its proximity to markets in the United States. George Soros is a legendary hedge fund manager who is widely considered one of the most successful investors of all time. Soros managed the Quantum Fund, a fund that achieved an average annual return of 30% from 1970 to 2000. He remains the chair of Soros Fund Management LLC. The Hungarian-born Soros is also known for his vast philanthropic activities. He has donated billions of dollars to various causes through the Open Society Foundations. He is a longtime champion of liberal and progressive causes, making him a target of a variety of conservative conspiracy theories. Soros is believed to be worth more than $8 billion as of May 2022 and has donated more than $30 billion to charitable causes. Much of that money has gone to fund education and health programs, human rights efforts, and the furtherance of democracy. In recent years, he has donated lavishly to the Democratic Party in the U.S. Key Takeaways George Soros rivals Warren Buffett for the title of most successful investor of all time. He has plowed most of his vast fortune into philanthropic activities. His support for progressive causes has made him a target of right-wing conspiracy theories. Investopedia / Lara Antal Early Life and Education Soros, who is of Jewish descent, was born in Budapest in August 1930 and survived the Nazi occupation of Hungary, emigrating to England in 1947. He earned a doctorate from the London School of Economics before embarking on a career in banking. He founded his first hedge fund, then called Double Eagle, in 1969. Notable Accomplishments "The man who broke the Bank of England" George Soros is most famous for a single-day gain of $1 billion on Sept. 16, 1992, which he made by short selling the British pound. At the time, England was part of the European exchange rate mechanism (ERM), a fixed-exchange-rate agreement among a number of European countries. The other countries were pressuring England to devalue its currency or leave the system. After resisting the devaluation for some time, England floated its currency and the value of the pound dropped. Using leverage, Soros was able to take a $10 billion short position on the pound, earning him $1 billion. The trade is considered one of the greatest of all time, and Soros was declared "the man who broke the Bank of England." Soros and Brexit More recently, Soros has been vocal about the precarious future of the European Union in the wake of Britain's 2016 vote to leave the union and the continuing refugee crisis that has brought millions of Middle Eastern refugees to Europe. Soros warned of an existential crisis facing Europe. He has set forth a plan to rescue Europe from a pending crisis by tackling three major issues: the refugee crisis, territorial breakups like Brexit, and the austerity crisis that has plagued countries like Italy and Spain. In particular, he has advocated that the European Union issue perpetual bonds, a method of financing that Britain used to finance the Napoleonic Wars. Soros was "the man who broke the Bank of England" before he became "the man who broke the Bank of Thailand." Soros's Investment Style George Soros is unique among highly successful investors in admitting that instinct plays a large role in his investment decisions. Nonetheless, he is famously well informed about economic trends on a regional and global level and is known to use this knowledge to exploit market inefficiencies with large, highly leveraged bets. Soros has both the capital and the risk tolerance to ride out these bets for longer than most hedge fund managers can. In fact, Soros has cowed a number of national governments on currency issues with his perseverance and deep pockets. During the Asian financial crisis, Soros added to his growing list of nicknames and became "the man who broke the Bank of Thailand" when he bet almost $1 billion against the Thai currency, the baht. Despite Soros' deep knowledge of global markets and excellent sources of information, the decision to close out a bet is reportedly more a gut call than a response to a market signal. One popular theory is that Soros has internalized so much of the market and its workings that he instinctively knows when the time has come to close out for a profit long before he can rationalize the decision. Whether that is true or not, whatever Soros is doing has made him a fortune that few investors in the world, with the exception of Warren Buffett, can match. What Is George Soros's Net Worth? George Soros's net worth, as of May 2022, is $8.6 billion. Does George Soros Give Any of His Money Away? The Open Society Foundations, founded by George Soros, "are the world's largest private funder of independent groups working for justice, democratic governance, and human rights." Soros has given a total of $32 billion to the Foundations. He has also supported education, giving a $500 million endowment in 2021, for example, to Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, N.Y. The Prince of Wales should register all his interests to prevent secrecy surrounding his private estate, a royal financial expert has warned. Charles is embroiled in the Paradise Papers leak after it was reported that he lobbied for a change to two climate change deals after the Duchy of Cornwall invested in an offshore carbon credit trading company. David McClure, the author of Royal Legacy - an investigation into royal finances - said the same rules should apply to the British Prince as to MPs, who are required to declare their financial interests. "When Prince Charles makes a variety of speeches on ecological issues, while at the same time he has had a shareholding in companies, we know nothing about it," Mr McClure told the BBCs Victoria Derbyshire programme. "Maybe it is totally innocuous, the whole thing that has happened, but it would be far better if (the Prince) just registered all his interests. What is he hiding?" The Duchy of Cornwall - which provides Charles with his annual income - paid 113,500 dollars (58,000) in 2007 for 50 shares in Bermuda-registered Sustainable Forestry Management (SFM). The heir to the throne later lobbied for a change to two climate change deals that would have directly benefited the business, the BBC and the Guardian reported. A spokesman for Clarence House denied that Charles had spoken out on the two deals to benefit financially. "The Prince has never chosen to speak out on a topic simply because of a company that the Duchy may have invested in," he said. "In the case of climate change his views are well-known, indeed he has been warning of the threat of global warming to our environment for over 30 years." The spokesman added that carbon markets were just one of many strategies Charles had championed to try to slow the pace of climate change. Sir Alistair Graham, former chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, said the British Royal Family should check their financial interests before delivering speeches if a change in public policy is being sought. "Increased transparency would be a significant step forward. Individuals have to take responsibility for their own standards in these matters," he told the BBC. "We expect members of the Royal Family to have the highest possible standards and Im sure on most occasions they do. "When there was a change of public policy being sought - it wasnt achieved, thank goodness - which would have benefited this particular investment offshore, then we should expect Prince Charles or any other member of the Royal Family to declare their interests, and if they dont know about their interests, that they check before they make public statements." Margaret Hodge MP, a former chairwoman of the Commons Public Accounts Committee, told the Guardian: "What is clear is that there should be proper transparency of all investments made by the Duchy of Cornwall, that the Prince of Wales should not be involved in investment decisions, and that the Treasury should monitor the investments to ensure that the reputation and integrity of our Royal Family is protected." Charless eldest son the Duke of Cambridge met two senior figures from the Duchy of Cornwalls management team - secretary Alastair Martin and finance director Keith Willis - on Tuesday. Kensington Palace described it as a regular scheduled meeting that has been in the diary for some time. William is due to inherit the estate on his fathers succession to the throne, and will take the title of Duke of Cornwall. The Duchy is worth more than 1 billion and provides Charles with an income of more than 20 million a year. It owns 53,000 hectares of land in 23 countries. Charles is overseas in India on the last leg of his autumn tour. His talks with Indias prime minister Narendra Modi are likely to be overshadowed by the latest allegations to emerge from the Paradise Papers. According to leaked documents, SFM, which counted one of Charless closest friends as a director, traded in credits from tropical and subtropical forests, but these type of credits were largely excluded from the EUs Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS) and the Kyoto Protocol. Four months after the share purchase, details of the companys efforts to lobby for amendments to the two treaties were sent to the Prince, minutes from a board meeting suggested. The documents were apparently sent to Charles at the request of millionaire banker and conservationist Hugh van Cutsem, whom the Prince met during his time at Cambridge. Charles criticised the EU ETS and the Kyoto Protocol in speeches he gave shortly after receiving the papers, the reports said. Neither the EU ETS or the Kyoto Protocol were changed as a result of the Princes lobbying, the BBC said. The Duchy of Cornwall sold its shares in SFM in 2008 for 325,000 dollars (246,000), according to the leaked papers, almost tripling its investment. The papers also showed the Duchy of Cornwall made offshore investments totalling 3.9 million in four funds in the Cayman Islands in 2007, the BBC said. This is legal and there is no suggestion the Prince received any tax benefit as a result of the investments in SFM or the funds in the Cayman Islands. A spokesman for the Duchy of Cornwall said: "The Prince of Wales does not have any direct involvement in the investment decisions taken by the Duchy. "These are the responsibility of the Duchy itself. The Duchy of Cornwalls accounts are independently audited and presented to Parliament every year. The Prince voluntarily pays income tax on any revenue from the Duchy. From the Archive Man in the Middle The Irrawaddy revisits this article from the run-up to the landmark 2015 election. On the second anniversary of Myanmars 2015 landmark election, The Irrawaddy revisits this shortened interview with the then chairman of the Union Election Commission U Tin Aye with Kyaw Zwa Moe published in the August 2015 magazine issue. Video of the full interview split into two parts is embedded in the text. Mr. Chairman, it is fair to say that two of three elections since 1988 were not a success. The results of the 1990 vote were not recognized. The 2010 election was deemed flawed. But the 2012 by-election, which you organized, was given a certain degree of credit. What will you do to make sure the 2015 election receives the same kind of recognition? Myanmar has very limited knowledge and experience of elections. There had been only four [full, multiparty] electionsin 1952, 1956, 1960 and 1990before the 2010 election. Judging the previous elections against my personal norms for an ideal election, they are not ones that elected outstanding and morally good people to represent the people. The first three polls took place during periods of anarchy. In the 1990 election, people cast their votes for a party because they did not like the other option. In the 2010 election, there was essentially only one party, which was backed by the previous government and therefore had lots of handicaps. You asked me how I, as the chairman, better organized the 2012 by-election. To answer your question, I reviewed the mistakesthere were both right and wrong things. I will continue to correct the mistakes and keep doing more to ensure the right things are better and more relevant. Do you hope the forthcoming election will be as credible or even more so than the 2012 by-election? Sure, it must be. Where the 2012 by-election was different from the 2010 election was in the matter of widespread advance voting [in 2010]. I have records in my hands about how many individuals from which parties won the election with how many advance votes. How will you prevent such things in 2015? I have prevented them since the 2012 by-election. Speaking of advance votes, I should really thank my seniors. They were far-sighted, because advance voting ensures that voters do not lose their rights. There are two kinds of advance votes. One is for constituents in a constituency. It can be given by those who will be traveling on voting day and the elderly and ill persons who cannot go to polling stations to cast votes. The ward-level chapters of the UEC go to their places, even if they are behind bars or in hospitals, and take their ballots in envelopes. This is how advance votes are cast in constituencies. When we get those advance votes in our hands, we have to make a list of those who cast the votes. We have a form to record them. Then we have to hand over the boxes of advance ballots before 6 am, when polling stations are opened. Advance votes that are handed in after 6 am are invalid. I have instructed that when the polling stations are closed in the evening, the advance votes must be counted first and the list must be hung on the wall of the polling station, because I fear that there will be voting irregularities to do with taking advantage of advance votes. For example, if there are 100 advance votes and the list of which votes have gone to whom is hung on the wall, there cant be cheating. You mean the Union Solidarity and Development Party [USDP] manipulated advance voting previously. Mostly. Mr. Chairman, you were elected to Parliament for the USDP. Is the party happy with your performance at this time? It is a matter for them. Allow me to blow my own trumpet a little bit. If those in power complain to me about such cases [regarding advance voting], I will call them and discuss it in line with the truth and the law. I wont make any compromises with anyone over anything that could discourage a free and fair election. I will dare to criticize anyone for anything that is against the law. If I do something wrong, I will not hesitate to apologize and I will not hesitate to be punished. If I do something wrong, just box my ears. I dont mind. So they [the USDP] dont like me. They do want me to favor them. They dont like me as Im not biased. You would ask me what I would do if somebody in power put pressure on returning officers. I have issued an instruction. I have told them that advance votes that arrive at polling stations later than 6 am are invalid and I would imprison them if they accept the advance votes that arrive after 6 am. I will conduct training soon and there I will carefully teach them about the must-knows, dos and donts. I will tell them what they must do, what they have to do, and if they dont, they will be imprisoned. But people still remain doubtful that the election will be free and fair. Frankly speaking, you are an ex-army man. And there are errors on voter lists. There are doubts as to whether the election will be held in unstable ethnic regions. What guarantee would you like to give to dispel peoples doubts? People may doubt the credibility of the coming election because I am an ex-army man. I dont want to say they should or should not doubt me. The winner will say the election is fair and the loser will say it is not. So, taking this into consideration, I have invited civil society organizations, thinking that it will be better if there are witnesses. CSOs understand election laws as they have given voter education. I have asked them to check whether or not my proceedings are in line with the law. I also invited international observers. There are two types of observers. Short-term observers come three or four days before voting day and go back two or three days after voting day. Long-term observers come on the announcement of the date for voting day. The Carter Center has been here [] and done a survey. It will send its team of observers who will monitor different areas. They will monitor the nomination of candidates, their validity, the election campaign, what our commissions do, how we count votes, how we will investigate allegations of fraud and how candidates enter the Parliament. I am allowing them to stay in the country from the day they arrive in the country until the elected candidates are sworn in and become parliamentarians. I assure you I will do my best. Everyone is keeping an eye on me. How can I cheat? Video [Part 1] Mr. Chairman, last year, you said that the military may seize power if there was instability in the country. Perhaps you said it because you were worried. But some viewed it as a threat. As UEC chairman, dont you think such words could damage the credibility of the institution? I dont blame those who criticize me. I did not mean to threaten; I said so because I do not wish it to happen. I joined the military in 1963 and passed the time under the socialism of the Revolutionary Council, and then the State Law and Order Restoration Council and State Peace and Development Council, and the country has lagged behind in development. You know that previously Bangladesh, Laos and Cambodia lagged behind us. But now they are developed. How have they become developed? With the help of grants, aid and loans. I am full of bitter experiences in my mind and in my heart. This makes me afraid that the military might need to seize power again. The military intervenes when there is disorder and instability. The military never seizes power when the country is peaceful. You may point out the 1962 coup. That was because of the weakness of the 1947 constitution. The military seized power, giving the excuse that [ethnic regions] could secede from the country [according to the constitution]. History will decide whether their reasons were right or wrong. I did not mean to threaten. We were blamed for the 1988 coup. There was no rule of law then, there were cases of beheadings, the administrative mechanisms had fallen apart, and there were fights at border posts and the US naval fleets [entered Myanmars territorial waters]. Under such circumstances, what would have happened had the military not seized power and just stood by? Think about it. It was not that the military seized power because it wanted to, but because it was inevitable. But then, as a result, the country suffered. We see now that the military, government and election commission are working in harmony. I think the military must have given a guarantee about this election. As the military has provided a guarantee, so has the government, I think. This is my personal view. I dont know if they are craftily playing tricks. But I believe we are in the same boat. If they do so, there will be a big impact. The country will be in trouble. I dare to persuade them and I would urge them [to not stage a coup] and to listen to my decision. What I want istoday, the Union Solidarity and Development Party is the ruling party, and it must be the best opposition party if it loses the election. Critics would point to the 1990 election [the results of which were nullified] No. No. I want to deny that comparison. The national convention was convened for 1992, 1993. The National League for Democracy [NLD] should have acted shrewdly and attended the convention and gone along with the Constitution, no matter what was written in it. In fact, the Constitution was a step for the transfer of power. If the government at the time said the election would be held only after the Constitution was drafted, so it should have been. The NLD could have contested again. No other party would have been able to win that election. If they said they would change the Constitution again after it won that election, no one would have been able to stop it. It was not clever. Video [Part 2] What legal action will the UEC take regarding unlawful campaigning or encouraging people to vote for a particular party? Recently, some religious organizations spoke indirectly of doing so. That case is very delicate. I dont want to talk about it. It is a complicated issue. I asked them not to do it. I will take action if anything is against the law. But it is best if they dont do it. I hear that you will retire when your current term expires. What legacy would you like to leave for the commission? I will quit when my term expires after the election. As to your question of a legacy, I want to talk about the essence of elections. Elections are crucially important. They need to turn out outstanding and virtuous people. Secondly, political parties are very important. They have to constantly improve their capacity. They have to serve the country when they come into power. The opposition party should not disturb but cooperate. I want to instill these concepts. And I want my commission to be a strong, firm institution. Are you ready to take any bigger role after you retire? I wont unless the situation requires it. Bogyoke Aung San said that he would stand by and laugh at his comrades arguments, after the country gained its independence. I will copy Bogyoke Aung Sans words because I like them. I will not laugh, but I will stand by and watch. Unless the situation requires it, I will not take any role. You were a member of the USDP. Do you wish the USDP to win in the election? As a chairman, I am not supposed to have attachment to a party. It would not be wise. I do have an attachment, but I dont put it at the forefront of my mind. Anyway, attachment is the origin of a patriotic spirit. If you say you dont love your organization, I would say you dont have patriotic spirit. I am speaking the truth. I love the country. I love my organization. I love the military. I am willing to sacrifice my life for them. I love my organization. But I dont accept wrongdoing. I want the USDP to win, but to win fairly, not by cheating. They are my friends and colleagues who I have known for 20 or 30 years. I am willing to help them any time on personal matters. But if they ask me to help them to win the election, I will say sorry. In Person It Will Not Be a Good Situation if We Are Forced to Sign the NCA: NMSP Vice Chairman Nai Hong Sar addresses attendees at the UNFC stakeholders consultation in Chiang Mai, northern Thailand on Sept. 27, 2017. / Nyein Nyein / The Irrawaddy The New Mon State Party (NMSP) has an isolated armed group in the southern part on the country in Mon State. The group has not signed the nationwide ceasefire agreement (NCA) despite Myanmar Army pressure. The military seized at least four army bases from the NMSP in previous months, according to party leaders. The Irrawaddys Lawi Weng interviewed Nai Hong Sar, the NMSP vice chairman and former chairman of the ethnic alliance the United Nationalities Federal Council (UNFC). What is the latest update on the peace process? When will you sign the NCA? We need to talk a bit more with the National Reconciliation and Peace Center. Our Delegation for Political Negotiation will meet with them on Wednesday. When we agree upon the eight points to implementing the NCA, then we will sign it. We know we need to solve our armed conflict; we will not avoid signing the NCA. So, you cant say exactly when you will sign? Right. I cannot say when for sure. You met Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. What did you discuss with her? A: We mainly discussed how the Myanmar Army seized out bases and restricted our movement. It shouldnt do so and we lost trust while we were negotiating signing the NCA because of its actions. Trust is needed to build peace. She said she understood and that there should not me oppression when building peace but that she couldnt control the military based on the 2008 Constitution. She was frustrated with the lack of improvement with the peace process, despite her National League for Democracy (NLD) working hard for it. I said there were various points to a successful peace agreement. First, all people and groups should be able to participate in political dialogue. When South Africa built peace, they let all parties participate. We cannot make peace during conflict. We all need to participate to halt conflict. We also need a completed political framework in order to have dialogue. We cannot skip this step and prior to one Panglong peace conference, ethnic armed groups in Rakhine and Shan states could not have national-level meeting with people in their townships. We were unable to attend the peace conference, not having signed the NCA. What if we disagreed with things that were discussed in a previous conference? It would be difficult to amend them later for new attendees. It is better to go step-by-step. She did not respond to my suggestions. Why do you think the Myanmar Army seized bases from your armed group? To force us to sign the NCA. Why did they block your troops from training or even marching on Mon Revolution Day? We asked military officials this. They said they didnt want us to show military strength while making peace with the government. We said we wouldnt cause trouble. You have participated in peace negotiations under former President Thein Sein and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. How do they differ? U Thein Sein and the military had the same form. But, the NLD government and the military are different. It was easy to deal with during U Thein Seins government in the case of peace agreements. It became difficult under Daw aung San Suu Kyis government. What is your view on how Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is running the government? She is trying to approach national reconciliation with the military. But many ethnic leaders have a different viewpoint regarding her actions and trust her less because of it. What is the relationship between the UNFC and the Northern Alliance armed groups? We still communicate with them. We negotiated with them [in reference to the NCA]. We also used to work with the Arakan Army, Kokang and Palaung before. But they have a different stance than us now. Did you discuss the Northern Alliance with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi? No. If the Myanmar Army forced your armed group to sign NCA what would you do? It will not be a good situation if we are forced to sign the NCA. But we have reached many agreement toward signing and if they agree to our proposed points, we will sign. It took a long time to even reach this level of trust. We dont want fighting. It causes a lot of civilian suffering. How are you preparing in the case that they force you to sign the NCA? If our people cant accept the military actions and we cannot get our rights through political means, there will be another armed struggle. What do you think about how Daw Aung San Suu Kyi dealt with the crisis in Rakhine State? I dont know enough to say but I do know she needs to be careful in solving this conflict. If there isnt justice, it will be a problem later. News Analysis: Myanmars Ties to North Korea Prompt Questions US President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson pose with military commanders at the US Eighth Army Operation Command Center at US military installation Camp Humphreys in Pyeongtaek, South Korea, Nov. 7, 2017. / Reuters YANGON One of the key foreign policies of the Trump administration has involved a strategic rebalancing with Asia to deal with Chinas rising power, but Trumps focus so far has been on intensifying the pressure on nuclear-armed North Korea. Myanmar is not on his radar. Nevertheless, he is sending Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to meet Myanmars top leaders to discuss the situation in Rakhine State. Yet what about Myanmars past shady connections with North Korea? Will Tillerson raise the issue with his Myanmar counterparts when he meets them later this month? This is an area in which the United States can open a frank discussion as Myanmars leaders in the past have maintained a close relationship with the North Korean regime that included arms sales, missile development and the construction of secretive underground defense facilities. Some Myanmar generals have even been placed on a sanctions list as a result of their military links to Pyongyang. Among them was Gen Thein Htay, who as head of the Directorate of Defense Industries was a key person in negotiating arms procurement with North Korea. In July, US envoy Joseph Yun, the State Departments special North Korea representative, visited Myanmar where he met Snr-Gen Min Aung Hlaing and Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. Yun was in Myanmars capital to discuss Myanmars ties with North Korea, prompting analysts to question Daw Aung San Suu Kyis role and how much she knew about the militarys secretive activities and past links to North Korea and the current nature of relations between the two countries, including defense activities. In recent years, the United States has been pressuring Myanmar to sever its remaining links with Pyongyang as it transitions away from military rule. However, it is believed that some military officials and businessmen in Myanmar have continued to maintain interactions with Pyongyang. In July, the Asia Times published an article citing anonymous intelligence sources suggesting that North Korean instructors based at the defense services educational institutes in Pyin Oo Lwin northeast of Mandalay, have recently provided training on computerized fire control systems for battleships and assisted the Myanmar military in missile development at a top-secret defense industry complex near Minhla in the central Magwe Region and likely at other secret sites as well. In his meeting with Yun, Min Aung Hlaing said that Myanmar only had friend countries, not enemies, and desired to have relations with militaries across the world. Myanmars Foreign Ministry responded by saying that Naypyitaw maintains only normal relations with Pyongyang and definitely not military-to-military relations. Under the previous regime, Gen Shwe Mann, who ranked No. 3 in the ruling junta, travelled to North Korea and signed a memorandum of understanding on military cooperation in November 2008. The Myanmar team, which was led by senior military leaders, visited defense facilities and studied an air defense system, weapons factories, and ships. The former house speaker is now considered to be close to Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. Early this year, the Myanmar government expelled a North Korean diplomat. The government took necessary action against Mr. Kim Chol-nam, a national of the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea working as a second secretary at the embassy of the DPRK in Yangon, Myanmar, who reportedly belonged to the Korea Mining Development Trading Corporation, a document dated Oct. 6 from the Permanent Mission of Myanmar to the United Nations said. The company is subject to both UN Security Council and US sanctions for alleged involvement in exporting equipment that can be used in the development of ballistic missiles and conventional weapons. Burma American Tourist Dies After Falling From Bagan Pagoda Shwesandaw Pagoda in Bagan. / Reuters A foreign tourist died after falling from the top of a pagoda in the ancient city of Bagan on Tuesday evening, confirmed the Nyaung-U police station. The US citizen injured her head and died while being transferred from Nyaung-U hospital to Mandalay Hospital, said U Aung Aung Kyaw, director of the Department of Archaeology, National Museum and Library (Bagan Branch). Weve put notices in more than 20 places not to climb on pagodas. I heard that she fell while she was taking pictures. That pagoda was prohibited for climbing, U Aung Aung Kyaw told The Irrawaddy. The victim, whose age is not yet known, was lodging at Thiripyitsaya Hotel, and a small stupa near the pagoda was damaged as she fell. Since last month, climbing has been prohibited on Shwesandaw Pagoda, one of the most popular sunset-viewing pagodas in Bagan after lower terraces collapsed due to rains. Previously, five temples were open to visitors to view the sunset in Bagan, but after hundreds of pagodas were damaged by a powerful 6.8 magnitude earthquake in August last year, authorities have banned climbing at most of the sites for safety reasons. Following the earthquake, the government constructed three sunset-viewing decks in order to discourage visitors from climbing the pagodas, said U Aung Aung Kyaw. Burma Myanmar Government Wronged by UN Statement Myanmar army troops patrol Maungdaw town in Rakhine State on Oct 17, 2016. / The Irrawaddy NAYPYITAW The Myanmar government feels wronged over a UN Security Council statement on the Rohingya refugee crisis that reflected international medias perceived bias of the issue, said presidential spokesperson U Zaw Htay. We feel wronged that UN Security Council members have echoed those allegations. What I would like to tell the international community on behalf of the Myanmar government is that we are trying to find a long-term solution for the Rakhine issue, said U Zaw Htay. The Myanmar government will continue doing what it takes to solve the problem, he said, but would not try to counter the (UN) Presidential Statement because it has already asked the international community to present evidence of the alleged human rights violations and abuses. The UN statement released on Nov. 6 expressed concern over reports of human rights violations and abuses by Myanmar security forces in Rakhine State against Rohingya, saying that abuses involved systematic use of force and intimidation, killing of men, women, and children, sexual violence as well as destruction and burning of homes and property. International groups such as Human Rights Watch have also documented killings and rape of Rohingya and satellite imagery showing razed villages, while access to northern Rakhine is heavily restricted. The statement also called on the Myanmar government to end the excessive military force and intercommunal violence that had displaced more than 600,000 people, the vast majority Rohingya in Rakhine State. We dont necessarily have to do as the statement asks. But we have to pay heed to it as it the Presidential Statement of the UN Security Council. We cant ignore it, said U Zaw Htay. The statement also urged the Myanmar government to work with the Bangladeshi government and the UN in order to allow the voluntary return of all refugees to their homes in Myanmar with safety and dignity. In response, the State Counselor Office issued a statement on Nov. 7, saying that it regretted a Presidential Statement was issued with regard to a situation that is in the process of being resolved amicably between two neighboring countries. The United Nations is turning a blind eye to measures being taken by the Myanmar government, said MP U Yi Mon of Pobbathiri Township in Naypyitaw, adding that the public should stand by the government on the Rakhine issue. What Myanmar should do is to steadily do what it takes. The truth will be uncovered one day, said U Yi Mon. When we approach a problem, we need to approach it from various perspectives, said U Zaw Htay. He added that voices represented by international media are louder than other less represented voices on the Rakhine crisis. While it is solving the crisis, the government also has to handle racial and religious instigation intended to trouble the government, he said. Public trust is a necessary condition for the government to make the countrys democratization a success and solve its pressing economic and social problems, he added. The Myanmar government has invited Bangladeshi foreign minister Abul Hassan Mahmud Ali to Myanmar from to Nov. 16-18 to discuss the repatriation of refugees, said U Zaw Htay. We expect to sign a bilateral agreement when he comes and Myanmar and Bangladesh will continue to cooperate on that, said U Zaw Htay, adding that the Bangladeshi government has not confirmed the date of the visit. Translated from Burmese by Thet Ko Ko. Burma Religious Affairs Ministry Targets Alleged Sex Predator for Defaming Buddhism A photo of Khun Tan on the altar of a house in Alantaya. / Hintharnee / The Irrawaddy NAYPYITAW The Ministry of Religious Affairs and Culture plans to sue Khun Tan, also known as Zat Lite, who reportedly postured as the next Buddha in order to seduce young girls. Though the aggrieved parties have not complained, legal action should be taken considering the crime, religious affairs minister Thura U Aung Ko told reporters at Upper House on Wednesday. The minister was coordinating to take action against Khun Tan under Article 295 (A) of the Penal Code which covers malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings and carries a maximum of two years imprisonment. In Mon States Thaton Township, Khun Tan convinced local Pa-O people he was the reincarnation of influential and respected Pa-O monk Alantaya Sayadaw Ashin Sakka, according to reports. Khun Tan arrived when he was seven in Thatons Alantaya neighborhoodthe area surrounding the monastery of Alantaya Sayadawwhere Pa-O custom advises that a bride thought to be born ill fated can be rebalanced by nominally marrying a man who has good astrological influence. With many parents in the area being led into believing that their daughters nominally marrying Khun Tan would be a blessing, the 25-year-old man is said to have seduced many girls between 2014 and 2016. Besides taking actions against him, [the government] should investigate and conduct educational programs in Alantaya. Punishing Khun Tan is not enough. He has fled and we are not sure if we could arrest him. The important thing is to educate and raise the awareness of local people and get rid of those [overly religious] attitudes, said Daw Khaing Khaing Lei, the chairperson of the Mon State Parliament Women and Child Rights Protection Committee. Khun Tan reportedly fled to his native Hopong in Shan States Taunggyi District some two months ago after Mon State government arrested some trustees of Alantaya Pagoda for renovating the pagoda without official permission. Translated from Burmese by Thet Ko Ko. Wednesday, Nov 8th, 2017 (12:17 pm) - Score 2,581 Cable operator WightFibre has this week taken the wraps off their plan to deploy a new full fibre (FTTH) ultrafast broadband network to cover 53,000 of the 61,000 homes on the Isle of Wight (Hampshire, UK) by the end of 2022, which is being supported by an investment of 35 million (Infracapital). At present the provider already offers broadband download speeds of up to 152Mbps via their existing cable (DOCSIS) hybrid fibre network, although theyve been conducting trials of a new Gigabit (1000Mbps+) capable network using Fibre-to-the-Home (FTTH/P) technology since 2016 (here) and have also recently done a lot of work to boost their network capacity (here). At the end of last year ISPreview.co.uk revealed that the commercial roll-out of WightFibres new FTTH network would begin in 2018 and run until 2020, although at the time there were no further details and the plan was somewhat tentative. The operator has now confirmed that they intend to begin this rollout during mid-2018 as planned (more detailed deployment plans will be published prior to the start of work) and they will aim to reach all the main towns and villages on the island by early 2021. Annoyingly the announcement mentions both 2021 and 2022 as completion years, which leaves some room for confusion. WightFibres Gigabit Island WightFibre full-fibre broadband is true fibre broadband. It delivers some of the worlds fastest broadband all the way into your home using fibre optic cabling all the way from the exchange into your home. This compares to the Openreach network used by BT, Sky Broadband, TalkTalk and others which uses fibre to the cabinet [FTTC] but then copper twisted pair from the cabinet to the home. A full-fibre network is capable of delivering truly unlimited broadband speeds to homes and businesses. Being fibre optic all the way into the home also means the network is ultra-reliable and much less susceptible to slowing down at peak times. Currently serving Newport, Cowes, Wootton and parts of Ryde the WightFibre network will be extended to cover Ryde, Seaview, Bembridge, Nettlestone, Sandown, Lake, Shanklin, Ventnor, Freshwater and Yarmouth. The project will be complete by early 2021 and will cover over 50,000 home and businesses on the island. Unfortunately WightFibre has not revealed what sort of prices and packages will be available to local residents, although this should follow in the not too distant future. We understand that the operator will also seek to support their deployment by attracting investment from the UK Governments new 400m Digital Infrastructure Investment Fund for altnets; they aim to get 50% of the funding from this. Andrew Jones MP, Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury, said: I am delighted that just four months since launching the Digital Infrastructure Investment Fund, we are already seeing investment in full fibre broadband flourish. Todays investment will help provide people living and working on the Isle of Wight with first-class connectivity fit for the future. Working with private investors, we will be awarding providers more than 1 billion to bring this gold standard of broadband to people and businesses in all corners of the UK. Businesses will also be served by the new network. At this point theres not a lot left to add, although we understand that the rollout timetable should look a little bit like this: WightFibre Rollout Phase 1 Cowes, Netport Upgrade 2018-19 Phase 2 Ryde, Bambridge, Nettlestone 2019 Phase 3 Sandown, Shanklin 2019-20 Phase 4 Ventnor 2020 Phase 5 West Wight [To Be Confirmed] The move should certainly give Openreachs fairly new up to 80Mbps FTTC (VDSL2) network on the island a run for its money, which was built with support from state aid (here). WightFibre always had strong objections to this. Otherwise some 20 new permanent jobs and and 112 temporary ones will be created by the deployment (mostly via the civil engineering subcontractors). An initial reaction to a Broadcom offer to buy Qualcomm in a transaction valued at $105 billion is that the deal has enough enemies to give it less than an even chance of being consummated. eWeeks Wayne Rash refers to reports that Qualcomm thinks it is being undervalued by Broadcom. Of course, $105 billion is an incredible amount of money. Qualcomm, however, clearly thinks that it is worth it and more. It is everywhere in communications. Most notably, its footprint extends into both Apple and Android products. And that presence is growing: Bloomberg points out that Apple products use mobile payment modules from NXP Semiconductors, which Qualcomm is in the process of acquiring for $47 billion. The other side of the coin is that Qualcomm has had a rough go of it lately. It has been a target of lawsuits and has lost Apple as a client for its modems, Rash writes. It is still in that game, since Intel, the current provider to Apple, must pay Qualcomm licensing fees for its patents. Apple has filed suit about those fees. The deal may face some stiff resistance in China. Reuters suggests that two issues may causes. One is that there are domestic companies that the government has an interest in encouraging. Keeping Qualcomm weak could be a good strategic move. The related reason is that Qualcomm doesnt have a good record in the country: Qualcomm agreed to pay a record fine of $975 million in China in 2015 to end a probe into anti-competitive practices related to so-called double dipping by billing Chinese customers patent royalty fees in addition to charging for the chips. The deal indeed faces challenges. Bloomberg says that Qualcomms unhappiness with the offer wont stop the suitor from appealing directly to Qualcomm shareholders. The situation is complex. Broadcom is simultaneously trying to acquire Brocade Communications Systems, though the story says it is facing regulatory resistance. Broadcom this week promised President Trump that the company would move its headquarters from Singapore to the United States. That, of course, couldnt hurt as the company seeks to move though the regulatory obstacle course. Its a complex game. CNBC suggests, for instance, that the legal wrangling between Qualcomm and Apple could go by the wayside if Broadcom, which the story says has cordial relations with Cupertino, takes over. It is difficult for a deal to be made if one of the two parties is not a willing participant. In addition, there seem to be enough big entities that are uncomfortable about this deal to make it less than an even bet from happening. The Chinese, of course, are influential players. There is also a natural reluctance to have too much power over chips, the lifeblood of any mobile device, in one firms control. Carl Weinschenk covers telecom for IT Business Edge. He writes about wireless technology, disaster recovery/business continuity, cellular services, the Internet of Things, machine-to-machine communications and other emerging technologies and platforms. He also covers net neutrality and related regulatory issues. Weinschenk has written about the phone companies, cable operators and related companies for decades and is senior editor of Broadband Technology Report. He can be reached at [email protected] and via twitter at @DailyMusicBrk. Most data in the enterprise is distributed in a way that makes it difficult for organizations to turn it into actionable intelligence. Centralizing all that data in a way that an analytics application can effectively consume is often cost prohibitive. Commvault at a Commvault Go 2017 conference today announced that in 2018 it will be adding a portfolio of analytics applications along with a software development kit to the Commvault distributed data management platform. Based on the Solr enterprise search software and an implementation of the Apache Spark in-memory framework curated by Lucidworks, Commvault CEO N. Robert Hammer says the analytics engine built into the Commvault Data Platform will enable IT organizations to apply advanced analytics and machine learning algorithms wherever data is stored. Analytics is the new table stakes, says Hammer. The Commvault Data Platform makes use of a Universal Dynamic Index to create a virtual data repository that makes it simpler to both manage and move data across a hybrid IT environment. Commvault also announced today that it has formalized support for the Google Cloud Platform as a target platform for data protection and archival purposes. Commvault already supports Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure and Oracle Cloud. In a similar vein, Commvault also unfurled today a Commvault Endpoint Data Protection as a Service offering, a cloud-based implementation of the Commvault Data Protection Platform managed by Commvault as a cloud service designed specifically for endpoints such as Windows, Mac and Linux. Commvault does not support iOS or Android. In general, Commvault is trying to advance distributed data management across two axes. The first is a distributed instance of its platform in the form of either Commvault Hyperscale Software that is simpler to deploy on an x86 server or a physical appliance provided by Commvault. The second is to flatten the data storage environment by eliminating the need to move data into dedicated repositories for running analytics applications. The degree to which Commvault can achieve those two goals naturally remains to be seen. But the one thing that is clear is that pressure to converge all the data silos strewn across the enterprise has never been greater. The peak body for the telecoms industry, the Communications Alliance, has welcomed the launch of the iOT Alliance Australias guide to good data practice. The iOTAAs guide Good Data Practice: A Guide for Business to Consumer IoT Services for Australia was launched on Wednesday, and is the product of a major collaborative effort by industry, consumer representatives and regulatory bodies to address consumer-related concerns about business to consumer IoT services. The guide deals with what industry players need to consider when supplying IoT devices and services to consumers, and aims to promote industry and consumer awareness of good practice in dealing with data associated with business to consumer IoT services. Gavin Smith, IoTAA chair, and president and chairman of Robert Bosch Australia, launched the guide and said IoTAA believes that industry needs to step up and take responsibility for the inherent risks in Internet of Things services. Providers can rely too heavily on consumers to understand and mitigate risks. Communications Alliance says the guide focuses on measures that IoT providers can take to build consumer trust and understanding of safe use of IoT products and services. And, recommendations include that providers ensure the terms of use of their products and services are fair, and clearly expressed, particularly on uses of consumer data and secure use of IoT devices. The Guide is authored by IoTAAs Workstream 3: Data Use, Access and Privacy, chaired by Peter Leonard, Principal, Data Synergies. Input was provided by many industry and regulatory bodies, including many members of Workstream 3 and staff of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, Australian Communications Consumer Action Network and the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner. The Guide outlines seven good data practice principles, dealing with: Australian start-up EpiSoft has closed a $1 million capital raising as it prepares to further develop its digital health platform and expand globally. The capital raising was backed by private investors and is EpiSofts first investor raise, and follows a previous $250,000 government grant in 2013. Founder of EpiSoft, Jenny ONeill, a health IT executive with 20-plus years experience in senior roles and the first female president of the Medical Software Industry Association, says she believes there is a gap in the current investment market in Australia, and investors have an appetite for companies raising $500,000 or $3 million. But according to ONeill, there is a reluctance regarding the in-between growth stage for digital health companies due to EpiSofts slow cycle process and smaller sales and marketing focus. My experience has been that investors who do not know the digital health field are reluctant to invest in this space. We are also a scale-up business by which I mean we have revenue, customers and traction but we need investment for the next stage of growth in particular to execute the sales plan, ONeill said. The amount we were seeking falls between seed funding to get a new business off the ground and Series A where the amount sought is for significant expansion once the business is profitable. When you take into account these two factors, it limits the gene pool a lot to find investors where we and businesses like us meet the sweet spot. EpiSoft is an alumnus of Springboard Enterprises, an accelerator program run by SBE Australia, a not-for-profit which supports female technology entrepreneurs and Julie Demsey, general manager of SBE Australia, said: We need to more widely share the statistics on the positive impact female leadership has on the bottom line, as well as success stories of female led startups. We also need to ensure that gender bias is proactively being removed. I was in San Francisco last week and spoke with a VC firm that is disappointed in its own statistics of female led companies in their portfolio, so they are putting their team through unconscious bias training to help remove any bias from the equation. Satellite communications company Inmarsat has launched iMPACT!, a purpose-built space that uses what the company describes as revolutionary, disruptive technologies to visualise and model complex networks and solutions in an interactive and agile environment. In addition, Inmarsat says it will provide new applications that will allow end users to differentiate, plan and prepare a unified communications solutions around their specific operational requirements. Dan Alldis, Inmarsat Global Governments future technology manager, said: Our aim is simply to revolutionise how we present Inmarsats connectivity, by engaging emotively with our customers using the sorts of technologies you would find in Hollywood. We have partnered with major technology companies to create never before seen capabilities, providing a wow-factor, interactive space where Inmarsat and its partners can discover what customers need, and show them how Inmarsat connectivity solves their problems. Inmarsat says it is engaging further with its partner network in the next few months to create bespoke scenarios and content, showcasing the products and applications which provide a step change in unified terrestrial and satellite connectivity. The demonstration facility is housed at Inmarsats HQ in London, but Inmarsat says iMPACT! will be portable and exportable, taking the technologies to conferences and customers around the world. The world tour starts at the Inmarsat World conference in Lisbon this week and the MilCIS conference and exhibition in Australia, in Canberra, the following week. Andy Start, president of Inmarsat Global Government, said: iMPACT! is a great way for us to engage with established and new satcom users. It enable us to work with them to define their genuine requirements and shape a solution that ensures they get the most from their connectivity solution. Using the latest and most advanced technologies allows us to take a customer to places we wouldnt usually be able to, be that in geostationary orbit or visualising the antenna and hardware fit out in place on their airframes. Whenever a large event is on with huge numbers of people, mobile networks tend to suffer under the strain, but usage of Telstra's mobile network set a record for the Cup. The Melbourne Cup. It's the race that stops a nation, and in years gone by, was likely the race that stopped a mobile network. Fast forward to 2017, and with many years of network strain experienced at events such as New Year's Eve celebrations, or any major event, mobile networks and carriers are vastly more prepared than ever before. We also live in the age of social media, posting photos and short videos, right through to live streams via Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and other platforms. Indeed, it is enough to make a mobile network engineer weep, but again, the kind of activities that people get up to with their smart devices is long past being a surprise, so it's great to see Telstra's mobile network reporting record-breaking traffic. This came forth via a Telstra spokesperson, who issued the following statement: "With the huge crowds at Flemington enjoying the day, posting images and videos, and putting their best bet forward, we saw our mobile network at the Flemington track itself carry around 200Gb data in the 30 minute period before, during and after the main race. "For the day thus far, data on the network serving the track was up around 55% more than last year. This is a record for the Cup. So, without any data from Vodafone or Optus to compare, and knowing in any case that Telstra is Australia's 800-pound telcorilla, we hereby declare Telstra the winner of the Emirates Melbourne Cup data derby and expect them to smash the record next year! Apple has enjoyed great results despite the iPhone X not yet being available during Kantar's data gathering period, with Android strong in the UK and Xiaomi entering Spain. The latest smartphone OS data from Kantar Worldpanel ComTech reveals that "in the three months ending September 2017, iOS share was flat in Europe, but up in the US and urban China". On the Android side of the fence, we're told that "Androids stellar performance within the UK continued, with its share rising 8.2% to 63.9% in the latest three-month period". Dominic Sunnebo, Global Business Unit director for Kantar Worldpanel ComTech, said: "Maintaining or growing share in Apples key regions is impressive, considering that iPhone X was not yet available during the three-month period ending in September 2017. iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus sales were below the level of iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus sales from a year earlier. But, since the iPhone 8 is not the flagship, the comparison is somewhat meaningless. "Consumers buying lower-priced and previous generation iPhones prior to the iPhone X release will have a small impact on average selling prices, but this should be more than made up for when iPhone X sales begin at starting prices of US$999 and 999. On November 7, Kantar notes that Chinese brand Xiaomi "announced that it was officially beginning smartphone sales in Spain, the first European country where its phones will be available locally". "This announcement brings more disruption to the European smartphone market, and although it marks Xiaomis initial beachhead in Europe, the companys smartphones have been making their way onto the continent in significant numbers over the last year." Sunnebo added: "Across the Big Five EU markets of Germany, France, the UK, Italy, and Spain, almost 1.4 million Xiaomi smartphones were sold. Most of those were sourced from Chinese websites like Gearbest and AliExpress. Fully 63% of these shipments went into Spain, so it is no coincidence that Spain is Xiaomis market of choice for its European launch." Kantar notes that "Xiaomis existing success in Europe is not just limited to smartphones. Xiaomi was the fifth largest supplier of wearables and activity trackers last year across the EU5, where it sold 1.2 million activity trackers". So, what is the Australian data? Well, in the three months ending September 2017, Tamsin Timpson, Strategic Insight director, Worldpanel ComTech APAC, said: "iOS share of smartphone purchasing declined to 34.5% from 37.1% the same period a year ago. "With the latest three-month data only incorporating the first two weeks of Apples newly-launched iPhone 8, this latest device has had little impact on overall brand share and, certainly, less impact compared to its predecessor, the iPhone 7, which managed to capture over 5% market share in the same period last year. "The iPhone 7 remains the best-selling smartphone this period, with 10.1% market share. "Android share of smartphone purchasing grew by almost 7ppts to 64.9% over the same period. Samsung enjoyed considerable YoY growth, up from 30.9% in 2016 to 34.7% this year, driven by its Galaxy S8 devices and, to a greater extent, its increasingly popular A5 and J series devices. "The strength of these models allowed Samsung to hold on to its share of the Android market, growing slightly YoY from 53% in Sep 2016 to 53.6% in Sep 2017. "Aside from Samsung, growth of Android continues to be driven by Huawei, Oppo, ZTE and Alcatel with some gain also for OnePlus and Xiaomi, albeit from a low base. "These brands collectively account for 15.2% of total smartphone purchasing, rising to 27.8% in the low tier (